Dysmorphophobia
by jam2599
Summary: Fire does not cleanse. It simply destroys. An alternate story, Ken/Ran. Multichapter.
1. Problems

Note: this is chapter 1 of a work-in-progress. Please just tell me if you see anything wrong, like grammar, spelling, facts, etc.

Pairing: Ken/Ran

**Dysmorphophobia**

If Hidaka Ken had ever taken the time to sit down and make a list of things he did not like, the list would have been long—partially because, as any acquaintance of his new, he had the tendency to think too long about little things. For instance, he wouldn't have _really_ needed to include black-and-red soccer balls on the list (because they reminded him of hornets, and he had stepped on a hornet as a child) but., after an hour of trying to make sure the list was complete, he would have surely added this particular variety of soccer ball. Soccer itself, though, was not, and would never be, on the list.

Among the items that would have been listed first, because they actually mattered, were mirrors, cameras, men who wore makeup (though no, not for the reason you might think), movie stars, models, doctors, hospitals, and to the agreement of many people, burnt meat (once again, not for the reason you're thinking). Ken avoided these things in his life. He had removed the mirror in his apartment as soon as he'd moved in (it had been stored under his bed for an entire week before he accidentally broke it). He only used his television set for watching sports matches and news and weather channels, though he had been persuaded to watch cartoons a few times by the children he coached in the beautiful art of soccer. When he was sick, he did not go to the hospital, but most men don't go to the hospital for little things like fevers, food poisoning, and broken wrists (things he periodically suffered from, mostly at his own hand). Ken had even switched to vegetarianism for a few months to avoid burnt meat, before deciding that he was just _not_ the "tofu kind of guy".

There were some things that Ken hated that he could not avoid—he couldn't even _try_ to avoid. He hated smokers, for instance, and he worked with one seven days a week. He disliked the company of teenage girls, but he worked in a flower store that always found itself jam-packed with them. He hated computers, or at least the more techy-sciency-stuff, but he worked with a skilled programmer and hacker who had opened a mail account for him (which he never used or shared with other people).

He hated criminals—rapists, traitors, embezzlers, people who cheated on their math tests, even—but he found himself in their company all too often.

At least...at least then, he knew that there was a solution. Crimes could not be forgiven, or undone, but dangerous people are as easy to kill as the innocents they harm.

It was for this dislike, this hated thing, an item at the top of the list, that Ken was waiting in a hallway of an unfamiliar building with someone he'd only met a few hours before.

He sighed, bored by waiting for orders from Omi. He'd been given another costume to wear—this time, a cleaning company uniform, which his companion wore as well. Ken knew that Youji was far away, both physically and spiritually, dancing into the arms of their target's mistress and possible bodyguard. Dancing was on the list of things that Ken did not like, but he envied Youji's ability to blend in with strange and unusual crowds—even his ability to talk to people he didn't really know, like he was their best friend, lover, and confidante, all rolled into one. Ken bristled at the stiff, quiet man beside him—that skill would've come in _really_ handy with their new teammate.

Ken turned to look at the tall man, to try to size him up. Birman had barely introduced him to the group before sending them out on their next mission. In all fairness, the group of three had known about the mission a week in advance and had prepared for it. What threw the group off this time was the fact that they'd only prepared for three, and even if the fourth member would prove useful, he didn't have a place in schedule. Omi had rushed to secure another uniform for the new member, and Youji had tried fruitlessly to get more information from him than his name.

_Aya..._Ken thought. He made a face. It seemed like that name—simple, open, almost happy-sounding—didn't suit the man in front of him. He was tall, pale, closed-off (from the looked of his crossed arms and averted gaze) and unhappy. His unnaturally red hair hung around his face in what had once been a hair style, but now looked overgrown. Ken had yet to see his face close enough to pick out his eye color, though he remembered Youji saying something along the lines of "That guy must be wearing contacts..."

Ken did not know the new teammate's specialty—what type of weapon he used, what type of gun he carried, if he liked working behind-the-scenes or charging out in front—but he could judge from his body language and silence that the red-haired man liked to work alone.

He shifted from one foot to another. His legs felt like lead from running around earlier that day to only stand in place for three hours at night. He wanted to run around. He wanted to do cartwheels. He wanted Omi to call them into the room at the end of the hallway so he could slice someone's chest open...just to give his muscles a chance to move.

_Come on, Omi. What are you waiting for?_

"Aya," he said after another minute of agonizing, boring, might-as-well-be-dead silence.

Aya turned his face slightly and looked at him out of the corner of his eye. "What?" he asked monotonously.

"You..." Ken choked. Talking to him had been a bad idea. The other man's gaze suffocated him—his eyes studied Ken's face too hard. _Oh, they're purple—what, really?!_ he thought, having finally been given a chance to see Aya's eyes. But it wasn't the color of the eyes that was most alarming—it was the intensity.

Aya was sizing him up, too—he just didn't need to look at Ken's whole body to do it.

Instantly, he felt what he knew Aya must have seen in him—_you shouldn't even be alive right now._

Ken laughed loudly and turned away from Aya, covering the back of his head with his hand to completely block the view of his face from the other man. He felt nauseous. After a few moments of breathing, he turned back halfway and without looking at Aya, he asked, "So, do you like sports?"

It was a stupid question, but Ken decided, arbitrarily, that 95 percent of all questions that people ask each other when they first meet are stupid anyway, and the point was that he was reaching out, to get to know the guy.

It would be enough to see more than one emotion from him.

Aya turned away and did not answer.

Ken watched him for a moment, then took a deep breath and let it out. He walked around so that he was across from Aya, and even though the red-haired man was not facing him, he knew that Aya could not completely ignore him. "I guess that's a 'no', huh? I gotcha," he followed-up to his own question.

Part of him felt that Aya was being cold and stuck-up, but another part knew that personal questions were not allowed for their group in the first place. Of course, he wanted to make an effort to get along with Aya so they would be able to work together, but Ken knew that some 'types' needed encouragement to interact with other people, and so he would give Aya the benefit of the doubt.

_Now that I think about it, he doesn't look like the athletic type_, Ken thought. _He's all pale and scrawny. He must be a really good shot, or just REALLY low on money._

Ken looked at Aya again and noticed that a single long, gold earring hung from his ear. "That's nice," he said, gesturing to it. Aya looked back at him, reaching up self-consciously to touch the earring, to hide it from Ken. _Must have sentimental value_, Ken thought. "Where's the other one?"

Ken's list of unlikeable things did not include men who wore earrings. Sure, it included men and women who had _too many _piercings, and unsightly tattoos, but an earring or two on a guy was alright. The feminine piece of jewelry suited Aya, or so Ken thought.

What Ken hadn't thought about was the possibility that Aya also had a list, and that nosy people who asked him too many questions were on said list. If he had really known Aya (which no one did, or ever would, it seemed) then he would have known that though the taller man liked very few things, he would not have created a long, cluttered list of unlikeables just to fill up a page of paper.

Something that ranked above nosy people on Aya's list were questions about his past, and although Ken didn't know it, that was the sort of question he had just asked.

"Buried," Aya replied curtly.

Ken swallowed. He wasn't sure of what that meant, but it creeped the hell out of him.

"Cool, cool," he replied, wishing that Omi would send them the damn--

"_Siberian? Abyssinian?"_

Both men turned to the radio in the cleaning cart they'd been standing nearby. When Aya did not move to pick up the radio, Ken rushed past him and responded, "Hey there, Om—Bombay, what took you so long?"

There was a pause. _"Sorry, Balinese got side-tracked, though I'm sure that's not the story he'll give you later..."_

Aya snorted but did not comment. Ken rolled his eyes and waited for Omi to give them the order to move. He quickly patted his pants pockets to make sure his bagh nakh's were with him—he had lost one of them before on an earlier mission that, like this one, had also involved waiting around for several hours.

_Oh, right_, he remembered. _Cartwheels_.

"_Balinese has brought the target to the back room, along with two bodyguards. Do not waste any time in reaching him and finishing the mission. I'm depending on you."_

"Hm," Aya grunted as the transmission ended. He dropped to the floor and reached for something under the cart, leaving Ken to speculate until he pulled out a...

"Oh, yeah, that's inconspicuous," Ken spat sarcastically when he realized Aya's weapon of choice was a full-size katana. Aya did not answer, but instead stood and began to walk towards the service door to the room at the back of the dance hall.

Ken was fast on his heels. "You're not seriously going to use that for what I think you're going to use it for you, are you?" he asked.

This was ridiculous. His weapons, Omi's projectiles, Youji's wire—all could be hidden with ease. Some of them didn't even set off metal detectors. But a full-size, old-school, samurai sword?

It wasn't just impractical, it was downright melodramatic.

"I'm not a mind-reader," came Aya's quick reply. He picked up speed when he heard Ken following him.

Ken stared at his back before shaking his head and donning his bagh nakh's. _This guy won't last a month...or maybe even the end of this mission_, he thought, nodding to himself to affirm his doubt physically.

He came to an abrupt halt when Aya suddenly stopped, turned, and unsheathed his sword to bring the bottom of the hilt right under Ken's jaw. Ken's body went rigid but he had the presence of mind not to back away from the threat.

"Say it," Aya commanded.

Ken glared at him, offended that his new teammate would use that tone with him. _It's just like I'm a dog..._ "Say what?" he asked, cocking his head to the side as he smiled back at Aya, determined to not let the taller man know that he'd caught him off guard.

"Whatever you're thinking."

They stood still.

Ken remembered the mission.

"I...wasn't thinking anything," he answered weakly. _Damn him...I'll get him back for this. If we had more time I'd show him what's what but since Omi told us to hurry..._ He cleared his throat and added, "Anything at all."

Aya's eyes narrowed for a moment, and then he pushed his sword back into its sheath. "Good."

There it was again. Those eyes, on his face. Didn't he have the decency to just not _look_? Ken scowled, and when Aya didn't turn around he pushed past him, brushing one hand over his cheek and elbowing Aya in a none-too-subtle fashion. "Come on," he said roughly. _If he's going to talk to me like a dog then I owe him the same treatment._ To make a point, Ken turned for one moment and patted his knee, beckoning Aya by saying, "Here, boy, come and do a trick for me and I'll give you a doggie biscuit."

He knew that he'd gone too far—that he'd been too obvious—but he didn't care at the moment. His heart was pounding, there was no blood in his brain, and Aya was starting to think that he outranked Ken.

A strange look crossed Aya's face, but before Ken could really register it, the service door banged open and a pissed-off Youji exited, tracking blood over the floor and winding his wire back into its case on his wrist. He stopped when he was a few meters in front of Ken and just glared at the two younger men.

Ken peered past him into the back room. Three dead bodies, all male, littered the floor and benches. Ken realized that whatever woman Youji had been distracting had not been invited to the same party as the fine gentlemen who were, thanks to Youji, soaking in their own blood. Youji had proven that sometimes, a team of two was just as good as a team of four.

Scared by Youji's silence, Ken spat out the first joke that came into his head. "Did you, uh, have your period or something?" he asked nervously, motioning to the blood on the floor.

"Shitheads," Youji spat as he stomped past them.

Recognition of the situation hit Aya's face, and he turned to follow Youji down the hall, towards the exit they'd secured. "Will I still get paid?" he asked.

"How the fuck should I know?!" Youji shouted over his shoulder. Ken winced when he heard the door slam shut.

Omi buzzed back onto the radio. _"Abyssinian? Siberian? Balinese...? Do you copy? Is something wrong?"_

Ken gave Aya a short glance before answering Omi. "We're fine, Omi, everything's fine..." he winced again as he heard the door to their exit open and slam shut again as Youji stomped back down the hall. "We'll be out in thirty seconds."

"_That's good to hear, Siberian."_ Ken realized that he had, once again, called Omi by his name on a mission. _Oops._

"WELL?!" Youji shouted at Ken and Aya. Aya blinked at him, unimpressed by the show of anger.. Ken bowed his head to avoid Youji's ire and grabbed Aya's arm to lead him out of the building. "See you soon, Bombay," he said before turning off the radio.

Youji dropped them off in front of the flower shop before accelerating far more urgently than was necessary and tearing off in the direction of his apartment. Ken suspected that he was heading home only to clean himself of the smell of blood, throw on clean clothing, and head to a club of some sort. As he listened to the engine of Youji's car go into overdrive, Omi asked weakly, "Something...bad happened, huh?"

Aya grunted. Ken kept his mouth shut to prevent himself from unleashing a string of insults against Aya, who had pissed him off in the first place.

A glance in Aya's direction told him that the red-haired man was still carrying the katana. _Unbelievable._

"I'll see both of you tomorrow, then," Omi said as he turned to leave.

"Wait," Aya said quietly.

Omi halted in his tracks. "...yes, Aya?" he asked. Ken noticed that he put a little more emphasis into the older man's name than was necessary, and instead of leaving immediately, he folded his arms and stayed to listen to the conversation.

"I need to go somewhere tomorrow morning," he said. "I'll be back before the afternoon."

Omi's usually large eyes narrowed, and his face turned blank for a moment—it was his thinking expression, Ken had learned. It passed quickly enough, and Omi nodded, giving Aya a small smile.

"We'll see you then!" he said cheerfully. Aya gave the smallest of smiles in reply before stalking off into the night. Ken watched him go, and decided to wait for a few minutes before following suit...his apartment was in the same direction of Aya's, or so it seemed, and Ken didn't want to risk being alone with him. The temptation to sneak up on him and rip his spine out was too delicious.

As Aya disappeared, Ken realized that Omi had remained behind, too, and that he was studying his face.

Ken looked away. "Is something wrong?" he asked, shaken once again that night by physical scrutiny.

Omi nodded and stared off after Aya. Ken's blood pressure dropped and he took a deep breath.

"Can we sit down for a minute? I need to...talk to you about something," Omi replied without really looking back at Ken.

They found a snack shop that was handing out the day's unsold merchandise to entice nighttime customers to buy drinks, and sat down on a bench nearby the flower shop. Ken dug into his sandwich, suddenly aware of the hunger he'd built up while waiting. Omi barely touched his food, and instead sipped his drink slowly.

This was another look that Ken knew. Omi wasn't just thinking now...he was planning, calculating. He knew that whatever Omi wanted to talk about now was important, and he doubted that he would be given the full picture of whatever situation he was about to be dragged into.

"It's about Aya," Omi began.

Ken nodded. Aya was a troublesome guy. In one night, their teamwork had turned to crap, and Ken was fairly certain that if he hadn't had a damned partner to work it, he would have been able to complete his part of the mission without any problem. "What about 'im?" he asked, taking another bite of his sandwich.

"I need you to follow him tomorrow," Omi replied.

Ken nearly spat out the mouthful he'd taken. "What?! Seriously?" he asked. When Omi nodded, a confused expression crossed Ken's face, and he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand before continuing. "Look, I don't know where the guy lives, or where he's going, or when!" he said. Ken knew he was spinning out of control a little bit, but he had no idea how Omi expected him to accomplish this task, or why.

Omi nodded. "I know it's strange, but trust me, this will affect the fate of our team." His somber tone shut Ken up a little bit, and he waited to hear Omi out. "You can't let Youji know about this, or Aya, of course, " he said, "but there's something about...Aya...that I'm not sure about."

"Do you think he might be a spy?" Ken asked.

While Weiss had consisted of Omi, Youji, and Ken, there had been several reports of attempted assassinations against the Takatori family. The assassins were always found dead, usually mutilated, their bodies set out on display as a sign that the most powerful family in town was not to be fucked with. There had been one instance in which a man who had sought revenge on the Takatori family had survived an encounter with Takatori Reiji's bodyguards, but he had disappeared before his photo could be taken. He had never been identified by any media outlet, and Ken, along with everyone else who had heard the report, assumed that he was dead—that the Takatori family had found him and prevented him from trying to finish what he had started.

Ken doubted that a handful of bodyguards could have cut down so many assassins, considering the fire of hatred that burned throughout the city for the Takatori family. He knew that if he'd suddenly found himself in a crowded room with Takatori, filled with armed bodyguards, that he'd...he couldn't stop...

_Poor Kase. You only tried to help me, but I...should never have brought you into my problems._

Ken shook himself out of his own pity, and covered his face with his hands as he remembered the rumors that spies had found their weigh into Japan's underground—spies on the payroll of the Takatori family who sought to keep their employer's empire strong by breaking up anti-Takatori groups and slaying anyone who spoke out against the family.

If Aya was a spy for the Takatori family, Ken vowed to kill him. It wouldn't ease his mind but it would give him something else to think about for a while.

Omi laughed softly, and Ken pulled his face away from his hands to look up at the boy.

"I don't know what to think," Omi replied quietly. "The truth is that..." he cleared his throat. Ken narrowed his eyes as he realized that Omi had almost given away more information than he'd intended, but he listened and bit back his questions.

"I just need to know where he's going tomorrow," Omi finished.

Ken sighed. "Is that official Kritiker business?"

"As good as."

Ken went home defeated. He kicked little rocks here and there, wondering how the hell he was going to track down Aya and follow him without being noticed. He made a face and thought to himself, _I hope he's a spy. That way, I can rip him apart tomorrow. Tonight left me unsatisfied..._

He stopped when he realized that he was worked-up because he'd been denied a chance to kill that night. His usual outlet hadn't been doing the job. Ken wished for a moment that Omi would tell him he didn't need to tail Aya _or_ go to the shop the next day. He just wanted to throw on some half-clean clothes and take his kids out of school to play soccer. Or, maybe more to the point, he wanted to play a real game with some guys his age—not for money or anything, and not completely serious, but he wanted the workout, the exhaustion, the pleasure that came only from unrestrained physical activity.

_Uh,_ he thought. _I sound like Youji._

He saw a cat in his path and noticed that he was standing right in front of a crack in the sidewalk. The cat meowed at him and Ken took up a defensive stance, pretending that he was keeping goal and the cat was trying to get past him. He moved from side-to-side, and the cat lazily walked towards him, straight down the middle. Ken scooped it up and held it over his head triumphantly.

"Come on," he chided the cat. "Aren't you supposed to have good reflexes?" The cat yawned, bored. "I guess not," Ken joked. The cat meowed at him and he let it down, but made sure to pet its head and neck before letting it walk away.

He took the stairs to his apartment three at a time, thundering down the hallway to his door and unlocking it while making a good deal of noise with the keys. Ken stripped off his borrowed uniform and took a shower, then changed into a shirt and boxers. He felt restless and he couldn't stand the thought of going to bed or watching television.

Ken all but ran to his balcony and threw open the glass door, then rushed to the railing and leaned over it, looking down. There was no good use for his energy but he could at least watch the cars go by. He knew Youji was down there, somewhere, and he strained to hear the sound of an overworked car engine...

"Are you going to jump?"

Ken nearly _did_ jump, and he held onto the guard rail for dear life as he looked around for the source of the voice. In the dim light, he could make out the figure of a tall, thin man, standing on the balcony next to his and eating from a cup of instant noodles.

"Aya?!" Ken shouted. The red-haired man stared back at Ken wordlessly.

The idea that this was a fantastic, horrible coincidence struck Ken only for a moment before a switch flipped on in his brain. "Are you _stalking_ me or something?" he shouted over the empty space between their balconies, a little too loud, and also a little too angry for the occasion.

Aya's expression was indiscernible. "Why would I stalk you?" Aya asked quietly. "I just met you today. I have no interest in you."

Ken huffed. "Then why are you right next door to me?"

"This place was cheap. That's all I care about," Aya replied. Ken watched the steam that floated over his cup of noodles. As it shifted in the night air, he guessed that Aya had taken another bite.

He scowled. He was still hungry, he didn't keep his fridge stocked properly, and those noodles smelled damn good.

"Cheap, huh?" Ken asked, too prideful to ask if Aya had any extra cups of noodles. "What, is that why you're eating crap from a cup or something?"

He'd intended to bite hard, but when Aya simply replied, "Yes," Ken clamped his mouth shut.

_Does Aya have money troubles or something? Even if he does, we get paid pretty well. He should be able to eat better than that..._

Ken cursed under his breath. Aya had just become interesting. He _wanted_ to follow him, to see what Aya was spending all his money on.

"Goodnight, Aya," he called out as he fell back into his apartment. He received no reply, but he hadn't expected one in the first place.

As Ken sank into bed, he took a few deep breaths to slow his heart rate. He was suddenly excited, and also pissed off. Why couldn't he tell Youji about this? If Aya was dirt-poor or in some kind of terrible debt, he wanted to rub it in the red-haired man's face in front of the others. It would serve him right for barking at Ken like he was a dog. They were equals—but hell, Ken had seniority on the team!

_I wonder how old he is._

_I wonder if he finished school._

_I wonder what he really wants to do..._

Ken frowned. They had all left lives behind. He didn't know what Omi and Youji were missing out on, and he didn't care to guess. Other people's pain was too much for him to bear.

The night around him was quiet, but he could feel something stirring. Not too far away, Aya was probably getting ready for bed, moving around in his apartment like a normal person. They could all lie like that—pretend to be normal. Omi could pretend to go to school, but even when he was there, he would think about the missions and how the team was working together. Youji could flirt with women but Ken had never seen him in a long-term relationship. Ken could pretend to be a soccer coach, and a florist, and occasionally a motorcycle enthusiast, but underneath it all he was just...

...dead and twisted.

_Aya just wears it on the outside_, he thought. Ken amused himself by imagining that Aya didn't brush his teeth or wash his hair or take his clothes to the laundromat—he just thought about swords and killing and how to avoid going outdoors and letting sunlight touch his miserably pale skin. He probably wrote poems about death and blood. He probably hated talking to women and wished for an all-male society so he could practice what he knew and avoid the things he was unfamiliar with. Ken figured him to be a virgin, no doubt about it.

He set an alarm for the early morning and chuckled himself to sleep. The last thing Ken did that night was pull a pillow over his face. Gradually, the bad feelings about Aya disappeared and Ken wished he'd been more receptive to the new teammate. He forgot everything Aya had said...and could only remember the way he'd looked at him when he drawn his sword under Ken's jaw.

Ken swallowed. He didn't like that piercing gaze at all. He couldn't stand the thought of Aya seeing what laid beneath the smooth, constructed surface of his face, completely artificial, something he couldn't identify with, something that scared him whenever he looked into a mirror, something that wasn't Hidaka Ken, and would never be.

"Uh..." he moaned under his pillow. "Aya...stop _looking_ at me..."

Unfortunately for Hidaka Ken, not all painful things could be avoided. He would endure that painful gaze tomorrow...only after...tailing...Aya...


	2. Windows

Note: this is chapter 2 of a work-in-progress. Please just tell me if you see anything wrong, like grammar, spelling, facts, etc.

Pairing: Ken/Ran

**Dysmorphophobia**

**Chapter Two: Windows**

Ken frowned as he looked around the corner of the neighborhood dry-cleaning shop. He had followed Aya carefully for twenty minutes without being spotted—which, considering his notorious clumsiness, was something to be marveled. It helped, Ken supposed, that he could move quietly, and though his reflexes had been trained for less questionable purposes, they had been refined all the same.

He had found (though he hoped he wasn't jinxing himself with this observation) that though Aya looked around every minute or so, and that he seemed tense and suspicious, Ken's ability to follow far exceeded Aya's ability to keep himself from being followed. It was almost as if Aya couldn't quite see what was going on around him, like he was lost in his thoughts and could only attempt to watch his back. Ken stole a look at his face when Aya turned around next.

Aya was worried.

Ken's plan hit a bump in the road when Aya suddenly walked up to a car parked a block down the path he'd been walking, unlocked it, and climbed in. Ken cursed his luck and risked discovery when he dove towards a cab parked a few cars behind Aya, waving at the driver to let him in.

The man complained and told Ken he was taking a break, but when Ken opened his wallet the man unlocked the door and let him in the front seat.

"Where to, kiddo?" the driver asked with a yawn.

Ken leaned across the dash and pointed at Aya's car, which was heading down the road. "Follow that guy," he whispered, as though Aya could hear him.

The driver stared at him. "You're...you're not serious."

Ken sighed. Manx would have to reimburse him...he cleared his throat and said, "Hey, I'll give you everything I got—just follow that car, and don't lose him...and don't let him know you're following him." He watched the driver hopefully, though the fact that Aya was 'getting away' treaded on his nerves a little.

The driver nodded, weighing his options as a good businessman, before starting his car and following Aya at breakneck speed.

Ken was thrown to the side, unprepared for the sudden acceleration. "What are you doing?!" he shouted. "He's going to see you!"

"Relax," the driver said. "This street leads to a major commercial center, a library, and a college campus. Even if your buddy sees me coming, it's not like he'd think I was following him."

"You mean..."

The driver rolled his eyes. "Everyone uses this road. It's no big deal if a taxi heads down it, even if the taxi right behind a guy who owes you money or whatever."

Despite the driver's reassurance, Ken felt like—no, he knew—that Aya must have realized he was being followed. _I'm gonna get my ass kicked_, he thought. _As soon as I get out of the cab Aya's going to be waiting for me...he'll kill me...but where's he going? A guy with no money wouldn't have any reason to go shopping...and he's probably not a college student, though that would explain why he's broke...and I don't think he'd need to skip work to check out a book..._

Ken stared at the road, watching Aya drive without looking back. _Maybe he really is a spy...those are all good public places to meet up with people, to look inconspicuous._

He dreaded the idea of Weiss being under the surveillance of an organization lying in the shadows. Weiss was almost safe, after all. Ken trusted Omi and Youji more than he'd trusted anyone in a long time. If Weiss was being watched, the group would break up—Persian may even decide to hunt the three assassins down and kill them to tie up all the loose ends. Even if he could leave Weiss...

_...where would I go?_

"He stopped," the driver said, motioning to the spot Aya had parked in. The red-haired man was nowhere to be seen, and Ken cursed his luck (and ineptitude) again. Ken paid the driver and left the taxi, searching for his new teammate.

For a moment, he was certain that Aya would spot him before he could find Aya again. Ken searched for red hair, focusing on anything that was brilliant red and just above eye level. Panic set in.

_Where the fuck is Aya?!_

He wandered around, not sure if he should try the library, commercial center, or college first. A nearby map of the area revealed that the college campus contained a teaching hospital.

Ken stopped breathing.

It was sick, but he knew where Aya was going, where he had to be going. He couldn't put his finger on it, but the hospital made more sense than anything. He wasn't sure if he was just trying to punish himself by choosing the hospital. A part of him wanted to face that fear, the fear of being forced to stay in a room, and lie down in bed, and not see anything that grew or had ever been alive. But...the worst part was...not even wanting to let other people see you. Not wanting to catch a glimpse of your own...

He ran.

The path to the hospital wound around a small fountain; Ken couldn't help but dash around the curve, reminded of long-distance training on his high school track. The pleasant familiarity of the burn in his legs kept his mind from jumping all over the place. He knew he looked crazy. He was used to it.

Surely enough, Ken saw Aya's red hair for a moment before he disappeared into the teaching hospital. Ken didn't know if he'd been seen—no, that wasn't it. He was sure that Aya had seen him and he knew that he didn't care. He wanted to sprint through those cold halls and find Aya and drag him out and tell him to stay away from places where people died, or weren't allowed to die when they needed to. Where doctors made decisions for patients who couldn't see or hear or think. Where the decisions of doctors overrode those of desperate, pleading...

But, this was the present.

Ken tried to slow his breathing as he numbly entered the hospital through the front door. Aya was not too far ahead of him, completely absorbed in his mission, whatever it was, and the whole situation felt to Ken like an out-of-body experience. He wasn't there. He was just dreaming. The hospital was too nice to be real—it was bright and full of light and smiling people. Some of them held flowers or drank tea as they sat in waiting rooms. A wall of happy noise filled the building, and Ken could see several floors filled with caring people and white-clad hospital staff buzzing around, stopping here and there, talking, weighing options. Babies cried. People ate food in the cafeteria. Several middle school girls sat on the floor against a wall, drawing a large get-well card for a friend.

He'd remembered it so differently—but then again, if he just found the burn ward...

_Aya._

Ken's attention snapped back to his target. Sounds were resolved, people became distinct, and Ken's senses returned. He ducked behind a pillar and watched Aya take the escalator to the second floor before following suit. Once Aya turned a corner, Ken walked in the opposite direction to sit on a bench and wait. He knew that Aya's destination must have been one of the hospital rooms on that floor, and that the safest course of action would be to give Aya time to take care of his business and leave—that way, when he investigated the rooms he deemed likeliest to have been visited by Aya, he wouldn't have to worry about the secretive man finding him snooping around.

Unfortunately, Ken hated waiting, and it was even worse when he had to sit while doing it. After two minutes on the bench, he popped up and walked further down the hall, stretching his arms out as he did so. He noticed that he'd entered the maternity ward, and after letting a group of expecting fathers in the waiting room stare at his back as he filled a paper cup with water from a cooler to take a drink, he smiled, waved, and threw his cup into a recycling bin as he exited.

A glance at the clock told him it had only been seven minutes. The desire to move, to really move, had become problematic. Ken knew it would be dangerous to leave the floor altogether because of his short attention span; if he left, he would forget which floor he was on, and in which direction Aya had walked—_Ah._

Ken hid once again as he saw Aya return to the escalator, accompanied by a nurse. If Aya had been paranoid before, or had any _particular_ reason to be paranoid, it seemed as though he know was not, could not, and probably just didn't care. The nurse spoke to him, but Ken noticed she didn't make any of the usual gestures—there was no hand on his shoulder, no hopeful smile. Aya kept one hand over his mouth and nodded far too often, as though he wasn't nodding in response to any the nurse said in particular, but just the general idea behind her words. She paused when she was finished speaking, and then left Aya to speak with a doctor instead, shuffling file folders to, as Ken assumed, move onto another patient's case.

As emotionally gripping as all this was, the discussion between Aya and the nurse didn't reveal anything important, or even interesting, to Ken. _What did Omi expect me to get from this?_ He worried. Ken realized that he hadn't been aggressive enough—he hadn't followed Aya as closely as he needed to. _This is why I'm an assassin and not a Kritiker agent._

The logic behind that thought struck him hard. _Why did Omi ask me to tail Aya today? Does Kritiker not care about the identity of its hunters, so long as they can kill a couple of targets? What if Aya turns on us? Will that just be our problem to deal with? Is he stable? Where did he come from?_

Although he didn't know much about Omi's and Youji's lives before or outside of Weiss, he knew that both were willing to work with other people, and though Omi had a small temper and Youji could be arrogant, neither tried to live an isolated life. He wanted to think that his teammates, people he'd worked with for several months, were really just normal guys who'd been pushed into a strange situation. He wanted to think that neither would present any sort of threat to himself or The Mission—the big one, the one they were really in Weiss for, the thing that they could die for. He wanted to think that even if they did become dangerous, he would be able to run. He wanted to see them as they tried to be—a bright kid and a, well, gigolo. Or something. Maybe 'playboy' was the right term. Man-whore? Ken wasn't quite sure.

He took another peak at Aya, who had moved from the hall to the escalator where he descended with one hand on the rail, his chin almost tucked to his chest, facing away from Ken. Once Aya had disappeared, Ken made his move, growing fearful of what he may find.

As Ken looked from room to room, he almost ran into a man on a ladder who was working on a broken light fixture suspended over the center of the hall. He took a step back, sized up the situation, and ducked under the ladder in search of anything that could point him towards the room Aya had visited.

"Whoah!" the man on the ladder shouted. Ken tripped and nearly fell to the floor, surprised that the man had noticed him and startled that he'd reacted so loudly and suddenly. He caught his balance, and when he looked up at the man on the ladder, he got a question he'd never really expected.

"Hey, kid! Are you Aya's boyfriend?"

Ken blinked. He was confused for several reasons. He did not know why or how this person knew Aya's name, why this person cared if he was or was not in any type of relationship with Aya, why it was assumed that he was dating Aya, if Aya actually had a boyfriend, and if that boyfriend would visit the hospital and for what purpose.

He tried to pick one question to ask, but the clutter in his brain gave way to one simple, beautiful idea: if he said yes, he would be considered Aya's family, and then he would be allowed to see whatever Aya had seen—maybe he'd even be shown the way to the room.

"Yes," he choked out. Ken laughed to cover his nervousness, hoping that he wasn't being video-taped and that said tape (or DVD) wouldn't be used against him later, either for blackmail or Youji's enjoyment. In an act of self-punishment, he added, "I am definitely Aya's boyfriend. I just have that _look_, don't I, that tells you I'm Aya's boyfriend?"

The man (a repairman, Ken guessed) looked as though he was torn between forcing himself to laugh at whatever Ken had said to be polite, and asking him, 'What are you talking about...?'. Instead, he climbed down from the ladder and walked towards one of the rooms, stopping at the doorway with his hand covering the name of the person in the room, his body blocking the view of the patient.

"Sweet kid, you know," the repairman told Ken. This idea immediately clashed with what he knew of Aya, but he kept silent so he could receive whatever information he was being given. "She was moved here a while ago...and her brother doesn't let a week go by without coming to see her..."

_Brother._

_Her brother._

_A week...how long has..._

Whatever Ken's original objective had been, this one, sneaky, botched little mission had become something else. _Once a week_, he thought. _Sounds...nice._ _How long did I stare at the wall...how long did I think about nothing...except how much better of I'd be if I'd just died?_

"Yeah," Ken agreed, as though he was used to Aya's schedule. _I AM his boyfriend after all_. "That's Aya for you."

The repairman looked back at Ken over his shoulder, his face twisted slightly in confusion, almost irritation. "You mean Aya's brother, right?" he asked Ken, moving aside to let him into the room. Out of the corner of his eye, Ken read the nameplate next to the door:

FUJIMIYA AYA

The less sensible part of his brain made him suspect for one second that there was some sort of ghost/zombie/psychic conspiracy afoot. _If Aya's in here, then who's out..._

When Ken saw the girl lying on the bed, he realized that the name of the person he'd met, the guy with unnaturally red hair, the new teammate, the next-door neighbor, fellow florist and murderer of men, was insignificant. She looked pale, and small, and Ken wondered how old she must have been and how old...**he**...was. The large hospital gown and bed, and the large window in her room, made her seem even smaller. In Ken's eyes, she was in a state of glorified death, kept alive by machines and the will of others. He found himself slowly walking towards her bed, as though he couldn't feel his legs, and he didn't even want to see her closer, or to touch her, but he was pulled to her nonetheless. Ken's fingers ghosted over the edge of her bed as he stared down at something so horrible, and vile, that only he could comprehend it.

He gently set one hand over hers.

"Aya," he said.

_Get up, _he thought.

She did not comply.

"I'll just leave you kids alone," the repairman said, closing the door to give Ken more privacy. Ken did not move, or acknowledge him in any way. The world had become small again, and he stayed on his feet, staring down at the girl who was dead to the world.

When he had looked at her face, for so long that he did not see her clearly...when her face had just turned to strange shapes that wouldn't stop moving...when he couldn't resolve the light and shadow anymore...Ken removed his hand from hers, and sat in a chair next to her bed. He held his face in his hands for a while, unable to get up or look at the girl once more.

_It's even worse for her. She's probably thinking or dreaming, but she can't tell anyone. She can't say it out loud, just to herself. She can't yell at anyone. She can't seem crazy because no matter what's going on in her head, no one else is going to hear it. She might be in pain, but she can't do anything about it. She...has a window that she can't see out of._

He sat up, moving the chair closer to her bed, and after failing to speak for a few minutes, he took her hand again and said, "Aya, I'll try to watch over your brother," as definitively as possible. "I see what he has to spend his money on, now," Ken added, smiling a little, trying to make a joke for the half-dead girl to, through no fault of her own, not enjoy. " I remember hospital stays being pretty expensive, but...I got mine taken care of, all in one go. You know, you're pretty lucky that...your brother comes to see you...though it would be better if you weren't here in the first place, huh?" Ken's gaze shifted to the window, and he asked quietly, "What would you being doing right now if..."

Her fingers uncurled slightly, and Ken noticed that there was something shiny in her hand...

An earring, identical to **his**, dropped out of her hand.

Ken stared at it. _Buried,_ he thought. _**He**__ said the other earring was buried._

/

Later that afternoon, Ken returned to a very quiet, very peaceful flower shop, filled only with the sounds of guitar music and shushing. Youji sat in a chair in the middle of the shop, playing something that Ken guessed was a song (though he'd never heard it before) that moved very slowly and, like something out of a children's story, had gathered all the girls on the floor around Youji. They sat on their sweaters and backpacks and, remarkably, just listened while he played. Ken noticed that Youji was smoking. _Omi must not be back from school yet._

Youji barely threw Ken a look of acknowledgment as he entered the shop, and in an effort not to disrupt the little bit of peace the shop was enjoying, Ken made his way through the shop with as little noise as--

CRASHBANGCRASHCLINGCLINHCRASHROLL...

Well, there went the new vase display.

"Hey, clumsy," Youji drawled. A few girls laughed at Ken's ready-to-be-delivered lack of self-control, as though it was an act he used to entertain them (it was not). Ken sighed and stooped to start cleaning up the broken ceramics, aided every few seconds by a girl or two who found a piece scattered around the shop floor. Ken tried to politely refuse their help, but they politely told him it wasn't a problem, which led Youji to laugh and ask one of the girls, "Hey, do you know what makes a party, a party?"

They looked around at each other, and Ken gave Youji a puzzled look, wondering if this was going to turn into some sort of joke.

He was NOT going to give anyone piggy-back rides to the ice cream shop again. No sir-ee.

One girl raised her hand. "Good music?" she asked, clearly a compliment for Youji.

"Not necessarily," he answered, "but thank you, young lady."

"Oh! Attractive guys!" Another offered.

"Depends on who you are..." he answered with a little mischief in his voice.

They looked back and forth until a third girl asked, tentatively, with a short wave of her hand towards Ken, "When...something gets broken...?"

Youji took the cigarette out of his mouth and pointed to her. "Exactly!" he shouted. The guitar was in his hands again and he started to play a different song, harder and louder. A few of the girls' eyes widened and they clapped and gasped out of surprise for the change of tone. Ken couldn't help but give Youji his best deadpan expression before cleaning up more of the ceramic mess.

If Youji was good at one thing, it was crowd control—specifically, female crowd control. (He was also good at playing the guitar, but that point was lost on Ken.)

Ken continued to clean up the mess, wondering where Aya was, and if he'd been to the store yet. He dumped the last of the vases into the trash can and shouted over the music, "Hey Youji, have you seen Aya?"

The guitar strumming intensified as soon as Ken opened his mouth, and Youji shouted back, over the sound of his own music, "What?"

Ken frowned. Even if Youji was still acting mostly good-humored, he had clearly not forgiven Ken for the night before. "Where. Is. Aya."

It felt strange to use that name for him, but he still didn't know "Aya"'s real name, and there was no way, that Ken knew of at least, that Youji would have known that "Aya" wasn't "Aya".

Youji didn't answer at first, and the music changed again to something faster. He sang over the new song:

"_Ken just came back_

_to the shop_

_where was he?_

_No one knows!_

_He wants to know_

_where Aya is!_

_Please tell him_

_Do you know?"_

The girls clapped and cheered for his quick thinking, and Youji smirked at Ken before continuing.

"_The good girls_

_Saw Aya go_

_Ken is dumb_

_Ken is slow_

_Point him out_

_Tell him now!_

_Where'd Aya go?_

_Do you know?"_

Youji stopped playing immediately and held one finger up. He started to tilt his hand in one direction and suddenly, every girl in the shop had simultaneously pointed to the storage room.

"Thanks," Ken said, and again as he opened his mouth, the strumming started. "I hate you!" he attempted to shout over the music (in as good-natured and humorous a manner as he possibly could, of course).

"Bye, Ken! Everyone say, 'Bye, Ken!'" Youji shouted back over the group of girls.

"Bye, Ken!"

"Have fun!"

"I hope you find Aya soon!"

"Come in earlier tomorrow!"

Ken stomped off toward the storage room. He found "Aya" in there, as promised, with soundproof headphones over his ears as he checked over items on one of their inventory lists. Ken's pride as an assassin jumped a little as he realized that "Aya" had not turned to face him, nor had he given any sign that he knew he was not alone.

_So you get caught off-guard too, huh?_ He thought. _You're kinda...not that tough._

He watched "Aya"'s back as he worked, wondering if "Aya" was concentrating on the inventory or thinking about providing for his sister. Of course, such "provision" was only financial in nature, and if "Aya" managed to survive for some time in Weiss he'd have quite a bit of money for Aya, though he'd also be contractually chained to Weiss, which Aya probably wouldn't like if she ever woke up unless if she didn't value "Aya" as a brother, and if that was the case then Ken wasn't sure that "Aya" should put himself through so much trouble to help Aya, though it was his choice to make, and Ken was pretty certain that Aya would value the effort "Aya" put into keeping her safe just as he had valued the effort that Kase--

"Do you need something?"

Ken jumped backward and raised his raised, thoroughly shocked that "Aya" had noticed him. _I wasn't even moving!_ "I, uh..." he stammered. "I wanted to see what you were doing, and how things went today."

"You usually ask questions to learn that sort of information," "Aya" replied quickly. "Which you did not do." He pulled his headphones down so they hung around his neck and turned to face Ken. In the few seconds of silence that passed, Ken could hear one of the girls in the shop ask Youji to sing a song about her. The music changed again.

"And," "Aya" added, "There's nothing written about it on the back of my shirt, so..."

Pause.

"_There was a girl named Mika_

_And you really wanna meet ha'_

_'Cause she aced her math test_

_Suga mamas are the best..."_

"Youji, that doesn't make any sense!"

"Well, smart girls can become engineers, and then they can make lots of money...and then guys like me will hang out at their house all day..."

"Ahhh!"

"Really?"

"...yes. Really."

"I think Youji's pulling my leg!"

"Not until you're eighteen, sweetheart."

A look of frustration crossed "Aya"'s face. "Are you going to ask me?" he asked Ken, folding his arms as he tilted his head to the side.

Ken blinked. _What the hell were we talking about?_ "Ask you what?"

"How my day was."

"Oh," Ken replied. He shifted his stance to one foot, and then the other. Why did "Aya" have to look at him so hard? His chest started to tighten, and the feeling of nausea returned. "Well, I figured you weren't going to answer, so...why bother asking?"

"Aya" tilted his head to the other side and took a step forward. He stopped, though, at one step, his intense gaze the only real source of intimidation. "If you didn't think I would reply the whole time, why would you have given that as a question you intended to ask me, when you didn't want to 'bother asking'?"

"Uh..." _Shut up! I know "Aya" isn't your real name!_ Ken thought with childish vindication. He looked away, backing out of the room to get away from "Aya" before he threw up, passed out, or ran to a mirror to try to figure out what "Aya" was seeing.

He was saved by a clamor in the flower shop, followed by a screech of "Youji, you're smoking at work again?!", the sound of a squirt bottle extinguishing Youji's cigarette, the giggles and ruffling skirts of the girls, and the moans of a defeated would-be musician.

"Omi!" Ken shouted. He nearly ran into the door post as he left the storage room, leaving "Aya" to stare at the place where he'd been standing and ask himself, _What the hell was that about? _Although the music had stopped, the noise was far from finished and "Aya" sighed, placing his headphones back on his ears as he continued the inventory.

Omi dropped his backpack behind the counter and turned to face their could-but-never-would-be customers. He called over the ruckus, "I'm sorry for being late! Does anyone need any help?", holding up his hands to show that he would gladly assist anyone if it would mean they would actually buy flowers.

The girls buzzed around the shop, and when no one asked Omi for anything, he sighed and turned to Ken, who was approaching him far too quickly to be prudent.

Ken opened his mouth to reveal the details of his mission to the group's connection to Kritiker, but Omi whined over him, "I wish there was some good way to ask all these non-customers to leave if they're not going to buy anything..."

"Huh?" Ken asked, as though he'd forgotten about the girls. "Yeah, funny."

"It wasn't supposed to be."

"Oh. Anyway, about 'Aya'," he began, lowering his voice and moving a little closer to Omi, "I found out a few things..."

Omi nodded. "Let's discuss that in a few minutes..." he said, nodding in the direction of the storage room. Ken turned to look--"Aya" was approaching them, quietly watching the girls as they tried to talk Youji up, to ask him to start playing the guitar again. The red-haired man frowned; it seemed as though all the noise and activity made him uncomfortable, though he didn't let it slow him down as he made his way to Omi.

"Can we close soon?" he asked the youngest member of their team.

Omi smiled a sad little smile. "Not for another two hours, but most of them will go home when Youji makes it clear he's not going to play anymore..." He brightened and asked, "How was your day, Aya?"

"Aya" shot Ken a look that would have killed a lesser man. Luckily, his eyes didn't linger for long. "Fine," he replied in a cold, hard voice. He passed the clipboard with the inventory to Omi and frowned at the girls and the noise they were making. Ken watching in silent horror as "Aya" turned toward the crowd and shouted in as low and loud a voice as he could...

"BUY SOMETHING OR GET OUT!"

The shop fell silent.

Omi leaned towards Ken and whispered, "That was perfect."

As Ken watched the girls file out of the shop, some of them shooting dirty looks towards the newest member of the team, he wasn't sure if he agreed. For a guy with a younger sister, probably around the same age as the girls who visited their shop every day, "Aya" was terrible with girls. A glance in "Aya"'s direction told him that "Aya" did not enjoy dealing with crowds.

_Welcome to the jungle._

/

Ken told Omi about his trip to the hospital, though he chose to leave out certain details, such as the name of their new teammate's sister and the room in which she was kept. If there was information that could be used to threaten "Aya", or keep him in line, then Ken knew it would be best for "Aya"'s sake if he kept it to himself. There was nothing that Kritiker could use against Ken, and he realized that being without friends and family has its advantages. If Kritiker wanted something to threaten Ken with, they'd have to target the entire neighborhood soccer team—a rather conspicuous move, for a secret organization.

So he kept his mouth shut, pretending he'd forgotten, or hadn't noticed, things like addresses, the name of the hospital, and the physical description of the person "Aya" had visited—the only detail he passed on was that "Aya" had visited a girl.

"I see," Omi said once Ken had caught him up.

He waited for probing questions, but none came. Omi just smiled at him and after a few seconds of holding his breath, and then staring at the wall, and then staring at his shoes, Ken patted Omi on the shoulder and walked away, leaving him to tend to his computer.

_Thank God_, he thought. Omi was usually such a thorough guy, but that day he'd let Ken go without making him relive what he'd seen. What importance did it really have anyway? Now that Ken thought about it, it would have been too cruel to make him go through that—to make him hand "Aya"'s heart over. Omi wasn't like that. Even when he managed the other team members, encouraging them to do what Kritiker wanted and to not make a mess out of their missions, he did it gently. Everything he really thought and felt about the team was closed off. Omi knew how to lead, and mediate, and just deal with it.

So that left Ken, all by himself, to think about what he'd seen.

/

Let's see if anyone spotted the three unlucky things Ken has done so far.

Would anyone like to Beta this story?


	3. Push and Pull

Notes: I'd like to give a word of thanks to my beta-readers, mimymo and noir raven dravenwood! Thanks for reviewing, for editing, for correcting, and for improving chapter three! Thanks for your time and work!

**Dysmorphophobia**

**Chapter Three: Push and Pull**

The next morning, Ken stood outside his partner's apartment for a few minutes. He wondered if he should try to foster some sort of friendship with him by asking if he wanted to get breakfast and walk to work together. He knew that if he did get to ask the other man, he'd feel awkward whether he accepted or refused the invitation, but he wanted the chance to get to know "Aya".

Ken frowned. It didn't feel right, to use that name for their fourth team member. It wasn't just because it wasn't his real name—it belonged to that girl on the bed, and Ken was disturbed that Aya's brother would use her name. It was almost as if her brother wanted to pretend to be her...or pretend that she was walking around...it was unnatural. Even if he didn't want to go by his own name or share it with other people, it was bizarre to go by his sister's name (a girl's name, Ken now knew) and he didn't want to carry out this strange wish.

_What should I call you?_ Ken thought as he stared at the door. _Abyssinian? No, Omi wouldn't like that, and it's not a good-sounding name either. Red, because of your hair? That sounds rude. Fujiyama? Fujitaka? Fujimiya...was that it?_

_Works for me._

He reached for the door for a moment, but decided against knocking and laid his fingertips against the old, painted wood. Today wasn't the right day...eating together, walking together, was something that friends did, and he didn't know enough about Fujimiya to pretend that they had that sort of relationship. Sure, he knew things that would give Kritiker the necessary ammunition for keeping Fujimiya in line for a while (assuming that they didn't already know about the real Aya) but he didn't know what Fujimiya liked to talk about, or what was becoming more apparently important to Ken, the types of behavior that would piss him off. He pushed himself away from the door and hummed his way down the stairs.

_Fujimiya it is._

As Ken thundered down the stairs, Fujimiya Ran stepped outside his apartment and caught a quick glimpse of Ken before he exited the building. He hadn't expected to be accepted into their team very quickly—the others knew each other, knew how to work together, knew how to kill together. They probably had nicknames for each other, and inside jokes, and favorite tasks at the flower shop. It seemed that the team member he had the highest chance of getting to know was Ken. Each of his social encounters with his next-door neighbor had been uncomfortable, though, to say the least.

He could almost hear his sister laughing at him, telling him it was all in his head. _"You're so silly, Ran. You always think everybody hates you."_

He allowed himself to smile for a moment. _"Dopey, stupid older brother. It's okay. I'll force you to make friends., 'kay?"_

_Of course, Aya, of course._

"_No, Ran...try smiling a little..."_

/

/

/

Ken watched Fujimiya enter the shop about thirty minutes after he himself had arrived. He wore a sweater in a horrid shade of orange that clashed terribly with his red hair and violet eyes. His stoic face was unmarked by sleep, and Ken thought for a moment that he saw Fujimiya smile as he carefully closed the shop door behind himself, not allowing it to slam.

"Hey, Fujimiya!" Ken called, trying out the new name he'd spent so much time thinking up.

The smile disappeared from the other's man face immediately. "Good morning," he replied monotonously. His mouth was set tightly, unwilling, or maybe unable, to smile.

_Bad start today, huh?_ Ken thought. He wiped his hands on his pants, staining his clothing with the sticky fluid that had oozed out of the roses he'd cut for that day's bouquets, and walked towards Fujimiya. The new team member took a step back when Ken tried to approach him, and Ken honored his desire for personal space by stopping slightly short of him and turning to rest his back against the flower shop counter.

"Youji's not in yet," Ken informed him, "and Omi stopped in for a minute before he went to school. I think it was some business with Persia or something," he added in a lower tone, inclining his head slightly towards Fujimiya.

Fujimiya pulled back.

Ken frowned.

"Well, whatever," Ken said, standing up straight to see if Fujimiya would relax once he'd moved away. Instead, the other man turned his head to the side. Ken continued, a little distraught, but also glad that the other man's eyes weren't burning into him as they had done before. It made it easier for him to think. "It's not like I care what goes on with Persia anyway, as long as he doesn't give us orders to kill each other."

Fujimiya's head snapped towards him so quickly that Ken found himself taking a step back, just as he'd made Fujimiya do. "Has that ever happened?" Ran asked in complete seriousness.

Ken closed his eyes and laughed, turning away as he felt his stomach start to jumble. "Of course not. I was being rhetorical. Theoretical...hypothetical..." As he tried to find the right word out of a mix of similar-sounding words, he counted them on his fingers as if doing so helped him keep track of every word so that in the end, he could figure out which one was right.

Instead of helping him, Ran just nodded to let him know that he knew what Ken meant. He sighed and looked around the flower shop hopelessly, confused by their dual job duties and in no mood for dealing with their apparently broke, but still clearly interested, exuberant female customers.

Ran risked asking a question. "Do the three of you really like working with flowers?"

"Hm...well, Omi's pretty good at flower-arranging, and he knows everything about all the flowers we have, and how to plant and take care of most kinds of flowers. I don't know if he likes it, though. Youji treats it as stress-relief. I just try not to break things." He held up to hands to show he could be cautious (or at least that he wouldn't be able to break anything at waist-level) and smiled a little, hoping he could encourage Fujimiya to smile back at him.

No such luck.

Ken sighed. It was difficult to move their conversations out of the "I ask, you answer" format. He noticed that Fujimiya didn't really talk about himself, and just asked questions about the job or let Ken ramble on about whatever he wanted. That really wasn't going to work. When he and Youji were in the shop together, they sometimes fought to see who could talk louder, because when two people who both have a lot to say break into conversation they tend to both try to make it go their way. The few moments that he'd spent trying to watch television with Youji had been intense—the two fought over channels the same way they fought over words. Omi was so guarded, mature, and collected during conversation that it was scary. Ken _knew_ not to probe into their link with Kritiker. Fujimiya seemed to just give up.

Sharing part of one's self, in order to get information and intimacy with someone else, was a tactic that Ken had used before to make friendships, pursue romantic partners, and get close to Weiss's targets on the few unfortunate missions on which Ken had been sent in undercover (as a "schmoozer", Youji called it). Of course, because of Ken's tendency to ramble, he knew that this wasn't really the best tactic for him to use personally; he would often forget about the other person and end up telling them everything about himself, about why he didn't like tea unless it was Japanese, and why Omi's hair style bothered him but he couldn't tell him to his face, and about the time that he'd tried lightening his hair only to have Kase call him a 'dandelion head' until he'd had it dyed back to dark brown, and how many push-ups he could do, especially the kind where you clap during the middle, and how long he could hold his breath underwater...

He drifted back to reality to notice that Fujimiya had left the counter and headed to the storage room. Thankful that their shop hadn't had any visitors yet, Ken pursued him, wondering what he should try to tell him about himself.

It had to be something important, both to Ken (to show that he was alright with giving part of himself away) and to Fujimiya (so that he could learn something important in turn). Ken slammed his fist against his open hand in determination.

Fujimiya spun around at the loud, violent noise. "What the hell was that?!" he barked at Ken.

Ken looked at his hands and then laughed as he pulled them behind his back. "Oh, nothing, I was just, uh, popping my knuckles."

_Damn,_ Ken thought. He let Fujimiya walk away and looked at his hands, surprised that one small action had caught Fujimiya's attention so strongly. He decided to wait a while to talk to Fujimiya—that way, he could pick the right thing to share.

Youji chose that moment to enter the shop. "Good morning," he said to Ken, taking a drag on a cigarette before flicking it outside. "No honeys, yet, huh?"

"Oh," Ken replied vacantly. He realized what Youji was asking after a minute. "Nah, the girls haven't shown up yet."

"Where's the new guy?" Youji asked as he found his way behind the counter. He sat down and leaned back in his chair, putting his legs up on the counter.

"Storage room," Ken replied.

Youji sighed, more out of annoyance than exasperation.. "He keeps to himself, doesn't he?"

"Seems so."

"What a drama queen...we really need some girls on this team, you know?"

Ken did not comment. If Youji was going to choose to make jokes about their team makeup, then he'd let him. He didn't really care if their teammates were male or female, introverted or extroverted, if they wore earrings that made them look like rock stars from the 1980's or if they obviously dyed their hair and weren't trying to hide it. He was too concerned with what part of his life story he should choose to share with Fujimiya.

He took a pad of paper out of the desk under the counter and padded his apron down until he found a pen. He began to write a list of everything he'd ever been happy about, and everything he'd ever been hurt by.

One thing stayed on the back of his mind—the one thing that hurt the most, the biggest loss he'd suffered. It seemed wrong to share that type of thing in a conversation. Instead, the last item he wrote on the list was connected to that day, but, Ken thought as he looked the list over, it still wasn't as pathetic. Crazy, unbelievable, and lonely, but not really that pathetic.

Or so he hoped.

"Ken? Hello?" Youji asked as Ken nodded at the list.

Ken jumped, laying one hand over his heart as he fumbled to shoved the list in his apron pocket. "What? What's happening?" he asked with a smile, trying to act like Youji hadn't scared the shit out of him.

Youji stared at him disapprovingly. "You have customers calling for you..." he trailed off, pointing to two girls standing near the flower shop door, waving at Ken.

Shaking himself, Ken smiled at the girls and walked over. "How may I help you?"

It wasn't much, but it was a day.

/

/

/

Lunch was calm, nothing less than a blessing for Ken. Omi had left school early and brought the group food from a restaurant he'd passed on his way back. Ken shoveled food into his mouth gratefully, curious as to why Omi had taken care of lunch—but then again, Omi was always taking care of the team, leaving breakfast for them, making coffee, encouraging Youji to stop smoking, reminding Ken to be careful—wait, that was a little insulting. Ken frowned. _I'm not that clumsy._

He waited to see if he could spontaneously fall out of his chair. It was a small victory when he remained upright.

_Take that, gravity._

He peered across their small break room table to watch Fujimiya eat. He'd barely taken any food, possibly out of politeness, and he ate slowly and neatly. Ken wondered if that had something to do with Fujimiya's upbringing. Maybe he was from the type of family that enforced good manners.

Ken's upbringing had been much more hectic. He was the youngest of four brothers, and had been a nuisance for both his mother and father since the day he'd been born. Energetic and starved for attention, he'd spent his youngest years building forts out of his brother's books, desks, and blankets, and progressed to soccer at age six when his parents had finally figured out that they didn't know what the hell to do with him. He remembered being punished maybe...three times during his youth. That was before he'd been sent to Catholic school, apart from his better-motivated, self-disciplined older brothers. The sisters had been much tougher on him, and finally whipped him into something—a soccer player. Not that that had been their intention, but hey, Ken hadn't become a bum or a criminal, so no big loss, right? His mother had cried and his father had just shrugged when he'd chosen to pursue the sport as his career. His brothers, on the other hand, had understood his drive and slapped him on the back and told him to "make them proud", which he'd done when he was accepted into the J-League.

His life story was pretty easy, up to that point. It was the stuff after it that had led Ken to that very table.

_Ah,_ he thought. _There I go again. I always think about myself and forget about everyone else._

Youji, on the other hand, had not forgotten about Fujimiya. He eyed the mostly-empty bowl with disdain. "I was wondering what made you so skinny," he said, pinching Fujimiya's arm as evidence of his lack of body mass.

Fujimiya flinched away.

Without looking up from his computer, Omi put down his bowl and said, "Youji, be nice to Aya." When he heard no response from Youji, he picked up his bowl again and ate silently. Ken peeked at the computer screen; it seemed that Omi was reading news stories online.

Youji pulled his hand away from Fujimiya's arm. "But really, you gotta learn to eat more," he told the other man, who had turned away from him slightly and moved his bowl towards the vacant side of the table. "Didn't your mom ever worry over you and say, 'eat more, you're so thin'?"

Fujimiya shot him a glare. Ken realized that if he replied, no matter how snappy the response may have been, that he may have been able to learn a little more about their new teammate.

"What was your mom like?" Ken asked suddenly.

Both Youji's and Fujimiya's faces showed surprise at the question. Ken watched expectantly as Fujimiya tilted his head to the side, considering the question, then made eye contact with Ken and narrowed his eyes. He folded his arms and chose not to answer the question.

Ken's face turned red. _Why don't I just ask him what his favorite color is, and if he likes cookies. Idiot._

As Youji prepared to comment on the question, and Ken's consequential embarrassment, the group heard the shop door's bell jingling as someone tried to open it from the outside. Since it was their break, the door was locked, and the three older members of the group knew of only two women who would demand entry to the shop during their lunch break.

"Omi, it's for you!" Youji called lazily, determined to not get up unless it was for a really good reason.

Omi shook his head without turning around. "Ouka's still in school," he replied tonelessly.

_Manx,_ Ken thought. The group hadn't received notice that they would begin a new mission soon, but Manx preferred to just drop by whenever was convenient, and rarely gave the team warning for her visits. This had to do, in part, with the fact that Youji had a habit of setting up a date-like atmosphere in their basement whenever he knew she was coming over, and not letting his teammates into the viewing room (or at least trying to kick them out—these attempts only confused Ken and annoyed Omi).

He jumped out of his chair to let her in, but as he made it into the shop, one of Youji's feet caught his lagging foot and tripped him. Ken grimaced from the shop floor as Youji stepped over him to unlock the door for their second, less direct link to Persia.

"Hello, hello, hello, Miss Alicia," Youji greeted her, offering her his hand as she entered the flower shop.

"Wrong," she replied curtly. The red-haired woman proceeded to ignore Youji, and began her slow walk towards the back of the shop.

Ever since the first mission briefing he'd sat through, Ken had noticed that Youji always tried to guess Manx's real first name. Because he had difficulty pin-pointing her race (as Youji would have put it, a beautiful woman is a citizen of the world and the king of his heart) he alternated the origin of his guesses each week. This was an American week.

He was surprised to feel his body being pulled backward and up by his arm, and turned to see that Fujimiya was helping him stand up. He found his footing and stood, dusting off the front of his pants, waiting for Fujimiya to say something.

Instead, the other man stared at him for a few seconds before turning away.

_Weirdo!_ Ken thought.

But, onto other things. He made a mental vow to trip Youji at a later point in time...preferably so that he would fall into something sharp. Or maybe he could just cut his hair while he was sleeping.

/

/

/

Ken flopped onto the couch in the viewing room. It was his usual spot, and he stretched his legs out as he always did. The fact that there was a new team member had escaped him, and it didn't cross his mind that maybe, just maybe, that team member would need a place to sit. So, when Fujimiya attempted to sit next to him, only to find that the otherwise vacant seat on the couch was taken by Ken's legs, he only frowned and walked back around the couch.

Ken sat up quickly, making room for him, but as he gestured toward the now-available seat Fujimiya simply leaned against the far wall and stared at the flat screen that hung from the wall, avoiding Ken's silent pleas for them to sit together.

_Fuck,_ Ken thought. He rested the back of his head against the couch. _Why. Am. I. Such. A. Retard._

He scowled at Fujimiya, who had unfortunately chosen that moment, and that moment only, to look back at him. Fujimiya returned the look in kind.

_I should...just ignore him..._Ken thought as he turned to face the TV. He absently put one hand over his face, imagining Fujimiya staring at the back of his neck.

"It's nice to see you, boys," Manx said as she began to play the mission disk. "I'm glad you're all here today, even though one of you should be in school right now and another, I'd expected to be hung-over or sleeping at some strange woman's apartment."

Omi chose not to reply as he sat in his usual chair. Youji rolled his eyes, leaning back in his recliner as he touched his lips, missing either a cigarette, a bottle, or aforementioned 'strange woman's' lips.

Without further ado, Manx stepped back from the TV and walked to the back of the room to stand near the stairs and watch the team's reactions.

A man in a darkened room, back-lit only by slivers of light from a set of blinds, appeared out of the darkness of the recording. Ken sat forward, resting his chin in his hands as thoughts of Fujimiya left his mind. Here, they were free from judgment, hidden in darkness, called upon as the executioners who worked under the guidance of an unknown, omnipotent judge.

Persia.

"Hello, Weiss," the shadowed man began. The screen flashed to an image of a nondescript building in an otherwise empty-looking lot, surrounded by a chain-link fence. The image looked washed-over and gray, and just as Ken leaned closer to the TV and squinted, trying to pick out details, the image blinked out and was replaced by photos of several men.

"These scientists have been linked to inhumane drug trials in the last five years. Sources say that they are working on a new anti-aging drug. A trial is being held in the building first shown, starting tomorrow night. Fliers have been posted around the city and surrounding areas, advertising the trial to anyone under the age of forty-one."

A light blue flier appeared on the screen, boasting of the opportunity for men and women to earn one month's pay in one night. The flier gave the location of the building, a phone number, and an e-mail address, but no information about the drug or the people conducting the study.

"Kritiker agents have found that the drug being tested in this trial is not one that has been recently patented, one that is under patent review, or one that had been studied by any major university in Japan in the last ten years. Its working name is Vitalum, though the identity of the substance is currently not known.

"Weiss.

"This mission has several critical objectives. First, the scientists must be assassinated to prevent further violation of human rights. Secondly, the hierarchy of the organization for which these scientists work must be discovered. Lastly, a sample of the substance must be obtained and transferred into my possession for identification.

"As a final note, I must warn you that the Takatori family may be involved."

At the sound of the criminal family's name, Ken stiffened. Takatori Reiji was the reason his life was gone, the reason that he could no longer play soccer, the reason that Kase was gone from the world. It had been a while since they'd been given a mission that related to the Takatori family.

Persia continued. "If this is the case, all information concerning this operation's chain of command must be turned over to Bombay immediately.

"Weiss, hunt down the futures of these dark beasts!"

The recording ended and the group sat in silence. Manx's heels clacked against the floor softly as she made her way to the light switch. The room flooded with light, and Ken could see that Youji's and Omi's faces matched his own, sobered by the prospect of facing off against a Takatori. He did not dare steal a look at Fujimiya's face.

He was already certain what lay there, if Fujimiya was really one of their own.

Youji suddenly snorted. "Takatori, my ass," he said, dispelling the dark mood in the room. "Persia's just trying to get our blood pumping."

"You don't think Takatori's involved?" Ken asked, surprised. He could see no reason for Persia to lie about the mission's connection to the crime boss. He was sure that Persia had his own reasons for hunting Takatori, and that he wouldn't play around with the name on a mission recording.

Manx slapped the back of Youji's head before he could reply. "Nothing is certain." she snapped at Ken so fiercely that he nearly bit his tongue. "If Takatori is involved, then Persia's hunch is right. If he's not...it's still a mission, boys. Stay professional."

"I do think that Persia probably has some sort of ulterior motive for mentioning Takatori off-handed like that," Omi said quietly, unimpressed by Manx's control of his older teammates. "This may be a personal hunch of his. I must admit, though, that a drug trial isn't really Takatori's style."

Manx frowned, but did not reply.

Fujimiya's voice came so low and sudden that Ken, who had forgotten he was in the room, snapped around to face him. "I don't see the point in arguing over something until we can prove it," he said sternly from his perch against the wall. After a moment he added, "I'm sorry that I have nothing else to say on the matter. I have very limited prior experience with Persia."

_Prior experience?_ Ken thought. _Does that mean he's worked with Persia before? How?_

"At any rate, your mission starts tonight." Manx told the group. She handed small slips of paper to each team member. "This is the address of the building. Three team members must enter the drug trial, unarmed, in civilian clothing. A fourth member will provide guidance and surveillance from a safe location."

"Done and done," Omi said. This came as no surprise to his usual teammates, who never bothered jumping at the chance to stay in a 'safe' place for a mission.

Manx continued. "It seems likely that there will be several hundred prospective participants in the building. The three inside members should gather as much information from the other participants as they can."

Youji choked. "Several...hundred?"

"Sounds messy," Ken agreed. He wasn't sure if he could trust himself around that many people—normal people, people who weren't supposed to get involved. Weiss' objectives, he knew, did not include the protection of those people. He tried to settle his mind with that thought.

The drug trial offer was clearly bad. Any reasonable person would run the other way in the interest of not turning up as a slave in a foreign country or getting hacked up so their body parts could be sold on the black market.

Ken had once been naive—he'd thought that people were good on the inside, that they wouldn't lash out and hurt and use each other for personal gain. When he'd been framed as the leader of an illegal gambling ring, though, too disgraced to return home, shunned by all but Kase, he'd felt his heart become a little harder. By hunting these scientists, they could spare other people the pain of isolation and betrayal.

He absently listened to Manx argue with Youji. "What, you're not going to stay, smell the roses, talk about the good times..."

"There are no good times these days, Mr. Kudou."

"Ouch, Kate, that hurts! You're in the company of a good man, you know."

"Wrong on the first, dead wrong on the second."

"Oh, the pain in my chest...there goes my heart..."

"You don't _have one_."

Ken twisted around so his arm was slung over the couch and he was facing Fujimiya, who stood against the wall with his eyes closed. Ken waited, wanting to talk to him but not sure of what to say. He could hear Omi leave the room.

Ken frowned, gathered his nerves, and realized one thing he needed to say to Fujimiya.

"Hey, Fujimiya," he said. The last-name still felt a little strange, but that was one of his smaller concerns at the moment.

The other man opened his eyes and stared back in silence. Ken was aware that he had probably been thinking about something—maybe the mission, maybe his sister—but his window of opportunity for getting to know Fujimiya closed a little more with each hour that they didn't talk, and since Youji and Omi had let him keep to himself most of the time, it was up to him to try to build a bridge. Never mind, if he wanted to have a minute to himself. Fujimiya lived alone, like the rest of them. He probably had _too much_ time to himself anyway.

"Yes?" Fujimiya asked.

Ken smiled as warmly as he could and looked away, letting his shyness take over, hoping that it would help Fujimiya accept what he was about to say. "Um...I'm sorry, about the mission going badly. It was my fault. I shouldn't have grilled you on our first mission."

Fujimiya blinked, unsure of how to handle the apology. Ken fidgeted as he waited for a response of any kind.

After a short, uncomfortable silence, Fujimiya frowned and said, "You didn't _grill _me..." putting on emphasis on the word as if he was complaining about it.

Ken sighed in relief. He picked himself off the couch, thrilled that one matter between himself and Fujimiya was settled and that he could get on with his day, and start preparing for the mission. He'd just assumed that they'd gotten off to a bad start because Fujimiya had been short with his answers to Ken's questions.

_Whatever_, he thought. _It was a mission, our first together. We were both bored and tense. It's no wonder that we didn't get along--_

"...you just annoyed me a little." Fujimiya added. He stared coldly at Ken.

The walls began to close in. Fujimiya's eyes were set on his face, critical, unkind. It started again—the strange motion, the paranoia. Ken could feel the scars from his surgery hardening through his skin. He remembered how his face looked—he could imagine all the imperfections. Eyes that weren't identical. So what if everyone had that same flaw—Ken could see it so very clearly on his own face. Skin that was badly burned, then...gone. Skin that wasn't his. A nose that didn't feel right. A face he couldn't remember. Things that would have felt normal, looked right, on someone else's face, but they weren't his and now Fujimiya could see that, see everything, because his eyes didn't feel anything, and they could look at his dead sister's face for hours--

As his blood pressure sky-rocketed, Ken remembered what he'd set out to do earlier.

_Tell him. He's asking for it. He needs to know._

_If he thinks he can just look at you...no, no. Now's the time. Set him straight. Push him away. Get closer. Just hurt his feelings. Let him know he hurt yours._

Ken's mind spun. That was it.

"Ken?"

He snapped back to the present. Fujimiya was watching him, concerned. There was that little change from before, like the whisper of the smile on his lips earlier, the surprise in his voice when Ken had talked about Persia sending them after each other, the genuine shock, and fear, and anger when Fujimiya had heard him slam his fist into the other. This time, the change stayed for more than a second, and the reason for the sudden emotion on the other man's face put a pit in Ken's stomach. He knew he looked crazy. That was what this was called—what it was grouped under. Mentally disturbed. Out of touch with reality. Unable to match what was going on around him, with what was going on in his head. Insane.

Body dysmorphic disorder.

Fujimiya did not walk towards him, or put his hand on his shoulder. That was what a truly concerned person would have done. Fujimiya was just confused. Omi and Youji had seen this before, and attributed it to some type of post traumatic stress disorder. Hell, they all got jumpy. They just...took care of it. It was too bad that Ken's trigger was something so common, so...

Ken's eyes met Fujimiya's. Why the fuck was he just letting himself stand there? It was just getting worse!

_Just tell him, just talk about it!_

He leaned against the back of the couch, letting his body sag slightly as he took his face in his hands. Fujimiya continued to watch him helplessly, and Ken took for granted that the other man would stay and listen.

"Uh, Fujimiya," Ken said stupidly from behind his hands. His voice was muffled, and he knew he sounded as distant as he felt. Thankfully, with his face covered he was able to calm down.

Fujimiya's weight shifted to his other foot, but he made no move to leave the room. Instead, he asked, hesitantly, "...what?"

"Uh..." Ken groaned. _God, this is going to sound so stupid. This is why I've never told Omi and Youji. Fuck..._

"There's, uh...something I should tell you..." he began. He pulled his hands down his face slightly, letting himself look up at the still-perplexed Fujimiya. "Could you hang around for a minute?"

A strange look crossed Fujimiya's face, but he didn't answer. His eyes dropped from Ken's face, and he looked at the floor, folding his arms across his chest.

The anxiety all but disappeared. Ken took a breath and timidly pushed himself off the couch, moving for the second time that day to stand beside Fujimiya. Once again, Fujimiya moved away, though by a slightly shorter distance this time. Ken took whatever he could get, realizing that though he'd come to hate being looked at, it was still nice...it still felt nice...to be physically close to someone. It helped that Fujimiya had a habit of staring into the distance and just ignoring him in general. Even if he wasn't listening, he was still standing there, and maybe he'd just let Ken talk.

Ken glanced at Fujimiya again. His mouth was tight, his expression set. The confusion had been replaced by something bland and unhappy. He resisted the urge to clap Fujimiya on the shoulder, or to try to establish physical contact in any other way, no matter how much he wanted the other man to loosen up.

"A few years ago...I got burned really badly," Ken continued. Like Fujimiya, he stared ahead at the couch and the blank TV screen. It was just sort of comfortable that way, though Fujimiya's silence made him fear that if the other man left, he wouldn't be able to hear it. He wanted to get through the story before that could happen. "It was...awful. I thought I was going to be in the hospital my whole life, but..."

He sighed. Details were unnecessary, and he found it too painful—and at some points, impossible—to remember everything that had happened. Fire. Pain. Needles. Shearing. Painkillers. Manx. Anger. Shouting. Compromise. Surgery. Omi. Youji. Home. The entire story was chopped into little pieces in his head, and Ken didn't want to risk letting the wrong ones connect. He continued, carefully, concisely.

"...but Weiss got me out, and got me a new face." He turned towards Fujimiya, just in case he was looking at Ken again. He wasn't. Ken smiled.

He turned back to the couch, smiling as he looked at the floor. "I don't really know about it. People say it looks okay, but for a while, I've...hated it. It makes me feel sick to see it, and to let other people see it and think it's me, because it's not. Sometimes, I..." he held up his hands, looking at them, remembering his claws. He bent his fingers, flexing and relaxing them maniacally before realizing what he was doing. Ken dropped his hands to his sides, folding his arms behind his back, against the wall, just to keep them in line. "...I feel sick when people look at me. So, I mean, not to be rude, but..."

"...you don't want me to look at you."

Ken swallowed. _Well, getting it out was easy enough...now dealing with what I've said..._

He rocked his head back and looked at the ceiling. "I mean, just don't look too hard. Like, don't stare. It makes me feel qu--"

"I didn't _stare_," Fujimiya snapped at him.

Ken frowned. He looked at Fujimiya again to see that he'd turned his head the other way, to avoid looking at Ken altogether. That all-or-nothing attitude pissed Ken off—it didn't give him the opportunity to rationalize the panic, to convince Fujimiya that he was sort of different, but not _weird_, that he wasn't _that crazy_, and that he could be normal.

Well, as normal as any of the four of them could get.

He tried to say something else, but this throat dried up. Silence passed between them.

Fujimiya suddenly pushed himself off the wall. "I'm sorry," he said quietly as he left the room.

Ken stared after him, completely confused. Why hadn't he asked Ken any questions? It wasn't the type of thing that people accepted so normally. _Hello, my name is Hidaka Ken. I coach a kid's soccer team during the spring and fall. I'm blood type B. I get sick and want to rip my face off when people stare at me._ It was the idiotic rambling of a vain woman.

/

/

/

Fujimiya Ran held the light blue flier tightly in his hand as he walked across the dark street. He, Youji, and Ken had been advised to wear clothing that would make a good impression, arrive a short while before the doors opened for participants, take different routes to the building, and not carry their weapons to the job. His sword and jacket were in a duffel bag with Omi, in the team's surveillance truck.

Youji had complained about the no-weapons rule and kept one wire—concealed as a watch, of course. After listening to Youji for five minutes, Omi had caved and, with his hands over his ears, told Youji that as long as he would shut up, he could keep his wire. Ran took what Ken had said earlier about his weapon to heart—it was showy.

That hadn't been a problem when he'd trained under the Crashers, but that group had just a little more finesse than Weiss, and their work was far less gruesome.

He didn't like the idea of crowd work. Ran had always had so much trouble talking to people, moving around them—he just froze up. He wished his sister could be there, to push him into the things he was afraid of, but without her physical presence, he could only rely on his memory of her, and how he thought she would have acted if she'd seen him.

Her old advice had come in handy when he'd chosen his clothing. Aya had always told him, _"You only ever wear black and white! With that pale skin and black hair you look like someone from an old movie—like, before TV's had color. God, you could learn a lesson from a rainbow!"_

He smiled. His hair was still red, just for her. The orange polo and khaki pants...she'd approve.

Oh, but there was always something he didn't have quite right, something he couldn't think of.

"_You should be nicer to Ken,"_ he would hear her say, if she was beside him. _"How often does anyone even try to talk to you? This is why you didn't have any friends. Someone goes out on a limb and whoosh! You let them fall on their face."_

He could use the old reasons. _No one likes me, no one ever will._

She would shake her head and smile condescendingly. _"Wrong, stupid, dopey older brother!"_

"_Leave your door unlocked once in a while."_

But what about Ken's door? Ran frowned. _You can't offer your hand and turn away. If he doesn't like being looked at, then it's strange for him to try to talk to me, at least to make a point to be more social with me than the others have been._ He wasn't sure how concerned with Ken's feelings he was...Aya would have told him it was just an excuse. That was fine with Ran, if he could get away with it.

A cold wind blew through the street, and he picked up the pace, all too willing to reach his destination, or at least the next street lamp. He'd never been much of a physical fighter. His sister had beat the way of the sword into him, and his natural reflexes had helped him survive that, but he couldn't protect himself. Even Knight had teased him about that.

He remembered the days when he and his sister were very little, and their parents had taken them to swimming classes. The pool in their aquatic complex had bubble vents in the deep end, and one day the coach had told his students to tread water in the deep end until the bubbles rose and pushed everyone towards the edges of the pool. The goal was to swim against the current, to find one's strength.

Ran had found himself under a mass of bodies, water, and air, unable to tell which direction was up, and unable to care. His little sister had dragged him out of the water, coughing and sputtering chlorinated water, and he'd spent the rest of that class with a towel around his shoulders, wishing his parents would take him home and never make him go to swim class, or try any other sport, ever again.

And Aya? She'd jumped right back into the water and told him to get his butt in gear.

It was the same with timed swimming. He was competitive, but he wasn't a fighter. When he'd sensed that someone else was closing in on him, even if their lane was far from his, Ran's resolve would break.

The rustling of fabric, or maybe plastic, caught his attention and he turned around. A small woman—no, a girl—wearing a red track suit was power-walking towards him. She stopped, apprehensive, when she realized that he was staring at her.

Ran's eyes strayed to the blue flier in the girl's hand at the same time that she found the flier he was holding. He opened his mouth to speak, but she ran towards him instead, waving her flier in front of her face as a greeting.

"Hi there!" the girl called as she closed in on Ran. He guessed that she was about sixteen, with short brown hair and large eyes. She looked a little like his sister, but without the fierce, ungodly intelligence.

He grunted in response.

The girl beamed past his coldness. Her eyes went straight to his flier, as if she wanted to be as obvious as possible, and she said, "Wow, so you're doing the study too! What a coincidence!" As the words left her mouth, she looked around and realized her mistake.

Surrounded by darkness, empty space, and silence that was only interrupted by infrequent nighttime sounds, it would have been strange for two people to meet on that dark street and _not_ have a common destination.

"Er..." she said shyly, fidgeting with her jacket as Ran looked on, unwilling to embarrass her further, but too socially awkward to try to make her feel better, "I guess it's...not a coincidence at all."

She stared at her shoes. He hated this mission already.

This was one of the times when he needed _her._

_I don't like meeting new people!_

"_Come on, Ran. Say something. You are such a PANSY. Freakin' talk, man, move your mouth!'_

There it was. The push.

"What's your name?" he asked in a voice too low to be considered cordial.

She ignored his tone, and looked up at his face, glad that she'd been addressed finally. "I'm Tomoe Sakura," she said, bowing slightly. Once she'd raised her head again, she asked in return, "And what's your name?"

Ran grimaced. That question again? He hated meeting new people. Brushing past someone for a few minutes in a social situation, if doing so would serves as a means to an end, wasn't so bad. What he couldn't stand was the name-trading, the need to forge new connections, the need to remember this and that, the need to keep in touch.

It wasn't just because of what had happened to Aya, either, or Knight's advice that he stop using his own name.

_Tomoe Sakura_, he thought in an attempt to create a mental dossier of the girl. _Attending the Vitalum drug study. Probably a high-school athlete. Appears to have a high level of physical fitness. May be prone to blurting and shameless acts of gregariousness. Extroverted and kind._

There. That was all he would remember from this encounter.

"It's nice to meet you," he forced out, keeping his voice low so it wouldn't waiver. Aya had always hated that. He extended his right hand to the girl, and she took it firmly.

"My name is Fujimiya Aya."

Sakura smiled brightly, unaware of Ran's mental torment and the emotional discomfort he forced himself through while they shook hands—once, twice, then down and apart. She turned towards the building and sighed.

"You know, I really wasn't looking forward to this study," she admitted as they began to walk. Ran listened to her silently, letting her voice flood the cool night as background noise. "I tried looking up stuff about Vitalum, but I don't know...it's like, I couldn't learn anything important." She laughed. "I guess if it makes people turn into frogs, the manufacturer really isn't going to tell people about it..."

Sakura sighed, embarrassed that she'd used such a ridiculous example in front of someone who seemed so cool and mature. She kept her thoughts buried, and Ran just ran her words over in his head.

An obvious question came to mind, and Ran found that it was his job—literally--to ask it. One of Persia's necessitated the verbal gathering of information about people involved in the study.

After another moment of tense silence, save for the sound of tennis shoes and boots padding against the pavement, he asked, "Then, why did you decided to attend the drug study?"

Started, Sakura's eyes snapped to his face for a moment, and he glanced back at her before looking forward. Since Ken had revealed his reaction to being seen and watched, Ran had begun to wonder if more people were like that. Ran hated attention, especially if that attention was some sort of effort to motivate him to succeed (which was why he only took it from his sister) and he wondered if Sakura would talk more if he didn't intimidate her by looking at her.

Given the amount of information she'd freely shared up to that point, and the fact that he had physically ignored her as much as possible given that they were walking down a street together, this seemed like a good idea.

Sakura turned to face the road ahead of them. The building was coming into focus, surrounded by groups of people huddled together under street lamps. "It's for my track team. We're all raising money so we can go on a few trips...you know, for meets...and I promised I'd raise a lot of money." She sighed sadly. "I...couldn't back it up, so when I saw this flier I thought, 'Wow, here's my chance!' I don't feel good about it at all, though."

Ran nodded, letting that stand. As they moved past the first groups of people, he thought that most of the participants had been lured by the promise of money. Even Ran had felt his heart jump at the offer. There had been a period in his life when his only thoughts were of scraping together enough money to keep his sister in a bed in a hospital. The situation was the same throughout the country—everyone knew about it. Families couldn't afford decent housing. Men worked two or three jobs, if they had children. Women often put up with sexual advances, at least if they wanted a chance to climb the corporate ladder. People killed each other over favors and opportunities. Police looked the other way to avoid stepping on the toes of the privileged, and raided the homes of the poor for small offenses. Health care was not affordable for most. Good Samaritans had disappeared completely, replaced by opportunists and scam artists. There had been a changing of the guard; if any good souls remained, they could only be those of the meek and voiceless.

Maybe...maybe it was better that Aya was in a hospital bed, far away from the world. Their Japan had changed, taken over, seduced, and corrupted by the power of the Takatori family. No one watched out for anyone else. No one could.

This was the reason Kritiker had risen...or, so Birman had told him, so long ago. To cripple the swelling giant. To protect people who were too caught up in their own lives and problems, to see the big picture.

Sakura poked his shoulder, and Ran flinched a little as he looked down, rubbing his arm to cleanse himself of the foreign touch before he could stop himself. Sakura didn't seem to mind, though, and instead of asking about the unfriendly gesture, she said, "Aya, I think we should get inside."

They were standing right in front of the building. Ran looked for Ken and Youji for a moment and realized that even if he found them, he was alone on this mission. At least for now.

"Um, Aya?" Sakura asked. She took a half-step towards the building and waited for him to follow.

He was surprised that she wanted to wait for them—were they friends now? When had that happened?—and after blinking at her in confusion, he followed, hoping that the girl would talk her way into getting whatever information Persia thought they could glean from the drug trial participants.


	4. Mistakes

**Dysmorphophobia**

**Chapter Four**

The building was crowded with people from all over the city—students, salary workers, construction workers, parents, even a few government workers who needed a little extra money. The story had become more and more common. The cost of living had risen, but workers rarely received raises, and it was impossible to complain. _Hell_, Ken though, _over the years, the cops have just made it clearer that there's no one to complain to._

He sat with a group of young adults close to the area where the organizers worked, giving people ID's and passing out forms and clipboards. The men (and couple of women) he'd sat down with were bikers, and they passed the time by sharing stories of the road. Ken listened intently, hardly caring that he wasn't doing his job. He missed the social interaction, and it wasn't often that he met other motorcycle enthusiasts.

One of the women, Yuriko, recounted the story of her unfaithful lover...someone she'd trusted, and forgiven in the past, who only betrayed her in the end. Ken and the others listened. It was hard to sympathize with her. Ken hated treachery, and he doubted that he could love anyone enough to take them back after he'd been betrayed. He wouldn't want anyone else to do that on his account, either.

Life, Ken had decided, was a team sport. You play nice, and fair, and hard, and good things happen. Sure, sometimes people switch teams, or the referee makes a bad call, but he believed that people ultimately needed each other, and had to help and trust each other, in order to survive.

Fujimiya's response from that afternoon had put him off. Ken felt as though he'd reached out...given part of himself away...and was left standing with nothing. He had hoped for some kind of reaction—surprise, disbelief, hell, even annoyance—but Fujimiya had rejected him completely, as if he was emotionless, as if talking about his problem hadn't hurt. Sure, it really hadn't been Fujimiya's business from the beginning, and Ken had given up the information freely, but he hadn't expected to feel so _dead_ after his conversation with Fujimiya.

He could have at least said...something.

Anything.

_Ah_, Ken thought, shaking his head at himself. _Yuriko is talking, and I'm tuning her out._

"In the end, it was my fault anyway," she said sadly. "I mean, he'd tried to make it clear that he was 'too much man for one woman'," she added, holding up her hands to make quotation marks in the air, her expression suggesting that she thought this was a ridiculous concept, "But me? I just hoped he'd grow up."

"It sounds like he didn't deserve you," Ken told her. It was words like these, however unimportant, that other people needed to hear for affirmation of their own self-worth. People were imperfect and weak. They couldn't just be left in their own heads, or they would give up completely.

She smiled in acceptance of this, and went back to a lighter conversation with some of the other bikers. Ken chanced a look around the building and found his two teammates immediately. Youji was talking up a storm with a group of women (several of whom wore wedding rings) close to the entrance of the building. Ken noted with envy that one of the women had brought tea and a set of cups, while another was holding a bag of cookies as she listened to Youji with rapture. The bikers didn't have any food at all.

Fujimiya was sitting against a wall, talking to a teenage girl who seemed much more animated than her companion. He nodded slightly every minute or so and let her talk on and on and on, and Ken realized that Fujimiya was actually smiling—though just a little.

This just put Ken off again. What the hell was Fujimiya's deal? Did he have a no-dudes-at-my-party attitude like Youji? Or did he just enjoy the company of teenagers? Then again, Ken and Omi were both in their teens (though Ken was at the far end), so that couldn't be it. He narrowed his eyes as he looked harder at Fujimiya.

He was _really_ smiling!

Ken leaned back against the mat he'd been sitting on. Whatever, it wasn't like his new teammate mattered that much anyway. Nor did he think it would be a good idea to reach out to him farther than he had reached out to Youji or Omi. In a moment of clarity, Ken realized that Fujimiya may have saved him with his coldness—kept him away, when he shouldn't have come closer from the beginning.

If he wanted to be that way, then Ken would let it be.

/

/

/

"So...do you have a girlfriend?"

Ran froze at the question.

So far, Sakura had mostly spoken about herself, but every once in a while she would throw in a probing question or two, testing Ran's amiability. He had learned, between these little jolts, that Sakura was the star of her school's girl's track team, and that her family had moved several times when she was young because of job shortages. She worked on weekends as a bicycle delivery messenger and felt insecure about her short hair.

Sakura had asked him how old he was (and had been surprised by the answer, given that he was five years her senior), what he did for a living (despite Youji's warnings that he not give his private information away, he told her that he was a florist), and why he'd attended the study. Her third question had been the first he'd hesitated to answer; now, faced with the 'girlfriend' question, he mentally fielded Sakura's newest inquiry to his absent sister, wondering what she'd say.

_Probably something like "I'm a girl, silly...there's no reason for me to have a girlfriend!"_, he thought in amusement.

But, more seriously, how was he supposed to answer?

As Ran choked on explanations, excuses, and the like, his body acted faster than his brain and he replied, "NO." in his lowest, coldest voice—something he defaulted to, unintentionally, when he was nervous. Sakura all but sank into the wall, waving her hands in front of her chest as she chuckled.

"I got it, Aya," she answered in good humor. "I'm too young to really care anyway, right?" Sakura laughed lightly at her admission, letting him off the hook for not having a girlfriend, but also for the fact that he had chosen to talk to a minor when he himself was not one.

"...right..." he answered softly.

_Damn. I'm no good in these situations._ Wherever his mental Aya was, she wasn't where he needed her—up and front, ready to kick his ass.

A little too late, he imagined Aya smoothing over the question entirely, or saying that she didn't have a boyfriend because she hadn't met the perfect guy yet—and she wouldn't settle for anything less. She could have coached him for this, instead of just teasing him as she'd done in the past.

People had talked at school—the Fujimiya boy (no one could remember his name, because he wasn't on a first-name basis with any students or teachers) had been known as a 'strange one', probably the type who hid from girls because his inclinations went the other way. Ran hadn't found any good way to fight these rumors, and though his sister had ignored them for a while, and Ran had done as little as possible to feed fuel to the proverbial fire, 'the question' had arisen one day.

_He'd been waiting for her after school. Aya was always late...well, she was late on Ran's watch, even if their kendo practice had started a whole two hours after school finished. He hated waiting outside the gate for her as she idly talked to friends, twisting one braid around her finger in a strange, humorous semblance of femininity._

_That day, though, as Aya had made her way over to him, her bag swinging in one hand as she straightened her uniform with the other, their usual ritual of trading stories of the day was skipped. Instead, Aya bumped into his arm, hard, and then just walked past him, her heels grinding into the pavement as she trudged down the street._

_Surprised by his younger sister's sudden anger, Ran had hesitated, and then followed her, keeping back a short ways so as to not encourage her to attack him again. They stayed like that until they had reached their house, and to Ran's surprise, his sister simply walked past their house. Ran had no choice but to follow silently, frightened, hanging his head after her as he wondered what had happened._

_They continued to walk through the city, and Ran snuck glances at his sister now and then to see if she'd look at him. He'd never seen her in that sort of mood before, and he felt vaguely like he'd found a feral cat, and wasn't sure if he should turn the other way, attempt to nurse it, or call animal control._

_His anxiety got the best of him, and Ran found himself choking out, "H-hey, Aya..."_

_She immediately spun on her heels. Her face was devoid of tear-tracks, though Ran wasn't sure if that was in his favor, or against. Aya marched up to him and Ran became frozen in place with fear._

_Once there was only a small distance between them, she glared at him as hard as she could and shouted, "Why don't you tell me anything?!" _

_Confused by this question, or rather, by this accusation, Ran's brow furrowed as he tried to guess what she was talking about. Aya's glare became more intense, and when her brother just shook his head and stared down at her, she turned away and folded her arms in a huff._

"_Look," she continued, the volume of her voice still scandalously high, "if you're gay, or whatever, just tell me! It wouldn't be the worst thing in the world, you know! You don't go around putting kittens on highways so you can watch them get run over or snap girls' bras just because you can, or shoplift because you're bored!"_

_At the word, 'gay', Ran found himself flinching, but as his sister's tirade continued he found himself less preoccupied with his sister's mention of his sexual orientation and more disturbed with her other comments._

"_It's not like," she continued, "you're a child molester, or like you work in the human trafficking industry, or like you run a crystal meth lab out of your bedroom! What is it, Ran? Why?! Come on, are you scared I'll call you a fag or something?" When he didn't respond, Aya closed her eyes and shouted, over and over, at the top of her lungs, "Fag fag fag fag FAG FAG FAG FAG FAGGGGGGGGG!!"_

_In an act of courage he wouldn't have expected of himself, Ran closed the distance between them and covered his sister's mouth with his hand. "What the HELL is wrong with you?" he shouted, only half as loud as his sister but still loud enough to attract more attention their way._

_Fortunately, most of the people on the street had better things to do, and no crowd formed to linger around the siblings. Instead, Ran found himself glaring with scared violet eyes into his sister's furious blue ones, trying to hold in whatever demon had suddenly possessed his sister._

_She ripped his hand away from her face and pushed him back, nearly sending him into the path of a young couple. Ran attempted to apologize, but Aya gave him no time in which to do so._

"_I don't KNOW you!" she shouted back, clenching her fists tightly. "I mean, come on, what are you so scared of? I already called you a bad word or the worst word or whatever, it's not going to get any worse!" she cried in desperation. They panted as they stared at each other, waiting for more words to come from the other._

_Questions raced through his mind—how had she known? For how long? What gave it away? Was she certain, or just making a guess? Was HE certain? Could anybody be, at that age?_

_And then, the questions became more painful as Ran realized why he hadn't told her...his reason, the real reason._

_Why would she care? Why would anyone care?_

_As the years of introversion caught up to him, a series of painful social encounters that had taught him never to speak up, even those few times he'd wanted to, Ran took a single brave step towards his sister and hissed, "Why should you care? Why should anyone? Gay or straight, it doesn't change a thing! I'm a cold person—ugly, weird! People have been saying that before they were whispering about me being gay! They've said it to my face! They've laughed at me, bullied me for being...weird! I was weird BEFORE I was gay!"_

_Ran threw his hands up in the air and laughed a little, too worn out from his sudden realization to realize that his behavior was compounding the ugliness of the label. "No one wants to date me, Aya! No one cares! Being gay doesn't change anything! I don't even like to touch people—even people I'm attracted to! What does it matter if I'm gay or straight, if I can't handle TOUCHING somebody?!"_

_He stopped, drained and defeated. Someone took a picture of him with their cell phone. An old woman shot them both a dirty look as she walked by and muttered something about kids being programmed by iPods. The world kept turning, even if it had suddenly become a little crazier._

_Ran lowered his arms. He'd always had a personal rule against talking. He vowed to never break that rule again. He lowered his face, reeling at the possible consequences of his admission and his judgment of the world, of his sister, of himself._

_Aya walked up to him and punched him on the shoulder. It didn't hurt enough to bruise, thankfully. "I care, you stupid pansy," she said quietly. "You're gonna fall in love some day and it'll matter then. You're gonna be surrounded by people someday who care about everything about you. You're going to realize...TODAY..." she said, as her voice became a little louder and she looked up into his face, "that your little sister doesn't like being the last to know, and that she wishes you'd talk to her more, because she thinks you're really hard to read sometimes, and that you keep to yourself too much."_

_He watched her silently, and when she was done talking, Aya took her hand away from his arm and waited for some type of response. After a few seconds of silence, Ran knew that, even if she didn't show it most of the time, Aya was just a normal kid. She didn't like being left out of anything. She was afraid of being alienated. He'd hurt her by being afraid of her._

_He wondered if he would ever do that again...not just to her, but to anyone. Was Aya right?_

_Would there ever be anyone else that he could push away?_

Sakura tugged on his sleeve and pointed to one of the doors on the other side of the building. The participants who'd made camp closest to the door had mobilized, forming a wide, disorganized line for some reason or another. Ken was close to the door.

Ran tried to catch his eyes, but Ken kept his back turned as he made small talk with the group he'd found. He remembered his discomfort from that afternoon, when Ken had suddenly told him about his condition.

His stomach turned. It was difficult enough for him to handle his own feelings and strangeness, let alone someone else's. If he was to keep from hurting anyone, he would have to avoid them completely, or learn from that afternoon with his sister...from all of his sister's advice.

He had closed the door to Ken, because he'd felt afraid and guilty. Ran's worry over what he'd done to Ken, which had sprung from sympathy, had been mixed up in his own attempt to reconcile Ken's emotions with what he'd experienced on his own.

He'd liked being left alone when he was young, and it sounded like that was what Ken had wanted, but...had he misunderstood? Was it one thing to not crush Ken with surveillance, but another to leave him alone completely? How could he, of all people, be expected to find the middle ground between the two? It was such a soft concept...he leaned his head against the wall, letting out a small sigh of defeat.

Fujimiya Ran was the last person on Earth who could be expected to handle that sort of thing.

Sakura rose next to him and offered her hand. He took it reluctantly, and as she helped him to his feet she asked, "Shall we get in line? I don't know what's going on, but it seems important..."

"Mm," Ran grunted. He lead the way, exasperated when he realized he wouldn't be able to get a place near Ken. Even if he couldn't do anything, or if there was a chance he'd just make a bigger mess of things, he at least wanted the opportunity to set things right with his neighbor.

Aya wouldn't have let him off the hook; that was for damn sure.

/

/

/

Youji stared blankly at the nurse in front of him. If the nurse had been female, and buxom, his gaze would have been kinder, but the overweight man in front of him pleased his eyes as poorly as the words that came out of the man's mouth.

"You want us to do _what_?" Youji asked in disbelief.

The male nurse's expression did not change—rather, Youji doubted that it could changed, since the man's face seemed to be made primarily of fat and keratin-saturated skin. "It's just a series of tests to determine whether you'd make a good subject for the drug trial," he replied in a bored voice.

Youji rolled his eyes. He'd jumped to the front of the line for this crap? No way. "How long will this take?"

"Just a few minutes. You'll be given a short interview, and then we'll check a few things like your blood pressure, heart rate, cholesterol...and perform a few stress tests..."

One of the women Youji had spend the wait period with saddled up next to him. "What's going on?" she asked, giving the male nurse an unimpressed once-over. He seemed not to care.

Youji clamped one hand over her waist and smiled lazily at her. "It sounds like they're keeping us here all night, baby," he replied smoothly. She twisted against his arm, laughing in amusement as he nuzzled her.

Without commenting on the scene before him, the nurse shouted, "Next!" and Youji followed him down the hallway to a locked room, blowing one kiss toward the woman he'd joked around with before he disappeared from sight.

/

/

/

Ken sat wearily on the exam room table. This place wasn't a hospital, but it didn't feel any kinder than if it had been. He was glad that he hadn't been told to change into a gown or anything like that, but the sinking feeling that he was going to be strapped down to the table and have some part of his body sliced open wouldn't leave him. He entertained ideas about leaving the study altogether until a woman in her forties entered the room.

"Hidaka Ken?" she asked. Ken nodded, meeting her eyes for a moment before dropping his gaze to the floor. He hadn't thought of changing his name—it might have caught someone's attention. Hopefully, though, if anyone had recognized his name, they would treat it as a coincidence. After all, he no longer had the face that everyone knew as Hidaka Ken.

The woman sat down in a folding chair in front of him and opened a clipboard, frowning a little as she opened his file. "So, good health, no surgery, no story to tell?" she asked quickly, without looking at his face.

"Right," Ken answered. There was no reason to give his real information away. Youji had drilled that point into him on numerous occasions.

She flipped to the next sheet on the clipboard, and Ken couldn't help but feel uneasy by the forms he saw underneath it. "What is all that?" he asked as she started to scribble on the second page.

"Just something for our records," she answered curtly.

As the scribbling sound continued, Ken felt his blood pressure and heart rate rise. The woman glanced up every few seconds, though Ken didn't know why. He flinched when she slapped the clipboard onto a nearby table and sighed, walking towards him.

She took his vital signs, and the urge to vomit arose inside Ken's body as he felt his blood pulsing against the inside of his blood vessels as the blood pressure cuff relaxed against his arm. He sat through it all though, because he knew that he needed to.

The blood pressure cuff was removed, and the woman flipped the clipboard open again. There was no sound this time, but Ken still flinched. This was so similar to how it had been before. His feelings and reactions were ignored. Ken massaged his left arm to get the blood flowing again, wondering what would happen next.

The study hadn't really been described to them, but that came as no surprise to Ken. He wouldn't have put it past these drug doctors to just pump him full of Leviatum or Vitamin or whatever this drug was called, and then send him on his merry way, regardless of the possible consequences.

"Ken?"

He looked up. He hadn't realized that he'd been clenching his fist, but he had. The veins in his left arm stuck out. Hideous.

"Y-yes?" he asked. Ken tried to act calm, but he knew the act wasn't working. The doctor regarded him with a strange look.

"We still need to run the stress tests," she said. Her gaze intensified, moving to Ken's neck and the side of his face. After a few moments of surveillance she asked him, "Are you sure you haven't had surgery? Plastic surgery, I mean."

Ken couldn't move. His mouth hung open. _The scars_, he thought.

_Do they stand out that much?_

"No," he answered uneasily.

The doctor's eyes narrowed. "I can see your surgery scars," she told him. Her voice seemed to be coming from the end of a long tunnel. "I do have experience with that sort of thing. You know, this drug isn't safe for people who have had surgery--"

"I haven't had surgery!" Ken exclaimed. He began to panic. Would this drug kill him? Pull him apart? He hadn't considered that possibility before, though it would be just like Persia to put the team into a situation with unknown dangers, without care for how they may have each been affected.

At the enraged tone in Ken's voice, the woman stepped back and pulled the clipboard to her chest. "I think you should leave the building," she said. Her voice and manner with tinged with fear, but more strongly than that, disgust.

Ken realized his mistake. He had been hostile. This was Fujimiya all over again, except now he was being told to leave, instead of being abandoned. "Wait," he said, gripped the exam table to try to steady himself. "Can I--"

The woman opened the door to the room and shouted, "Guards! We have a hostile one again! Take him out of the building!"

Ken stared at the doorway helplessly as it was darkened with the bodies of two guards. He had failed Weiss.

/

/

/

Ran watched Sakura enter one of the exam rooms. She looked back before the door closed, and Ran quickly gave her an encouraging smile. He was told he would have to wait a few minutes before another room opened, and he spent it listening to the sounds around him.

Some of the participants were edgy. A few had left, and since then, guards had been placed at all the exits from the building to 'encourage' the participants to stay. Others had simply left the line to take naps around the waiting room. Youji had finished his examination some time before, and it seemed that he had taken it upon himself to quiet the fears of the other participants.

The sounds of footsteps and shouts brought Ran out of his thoughts. There seemed to be a commotion around one of the exam rooms—Sakura's room, Ran realized. He took a step down the hallway, concentrating on those sounds and voices, trying to find out what was happening and if Sakura was involved.

"Holy shit!" one of the examiners swore. He dashed out of Sakura's room and ran into another room, shouting "Keigo! Keigo, you gotta see this bitch!"

"What?" another voice asked, 'Keigo' most likely. "She got one of those microskirts or something? She had a boob job?"

Something raw and angry flooded Ran's veins, and he nearly ran down the hallway to Sakura's room to rescue her from whatever danger she was in until he heard the reason for the examiner's shock.

"What she's got is a heart like a fucking HORSE," the examiner answered. "We're doing her stress test and she's not even FEELING it. Breathing normal, heart rate normal, BP normal, and she's running like a motherfucker!"

Ran watched, disturbed, as several more examiners flooded into Sakura's room. He heard a lot of laughing, swearing, and exclamations of disbelief. An exam room opened up for him but he let someone else go ahead of him in line.

He didn't want to risk Sakura being taken somewhere else while he was shut in an exam room. He couldn't rid himself of the nagging feeling that she would be dragged away to another room to be studied.

Much to his relief, Sakura left her exam room a few minutes later, slightly pink in the face as she fidgeted with her uniform jacket. She made eye contact with Ran and practically flew to his side, whispering, "They think I'm weird," before walking past him. He watched her sit down just outside the hallway, legs drawn up to her body as she stared ahead, trying to hide her face from the rest of the world.

"Sir?" one of the examiners asked Ran. He turned around, giving the man a deadpan look as he tried to not glance back at Sakura.

"What?" Ran asked. There it was again...the falsely deep voice. He cleared his throat, but he knew that wouldn't bring back his normal voice. He was too worried about Sakura. Her embarrassment may have just been due to the examiners' reaction to her physical fitness—and even then, Ran was certain that their claims must have been exaggerated to some fantastic degree—but it seemed as though she was troubled by something.

He glanced back. She smiled up at him, her worry gone. He smiled back.

It figured that the first person he ever befriended on his own was a non-threatening, pathetic lightweight high school student. Anyone else would've just overpowered him.

"There's a room waiting for you," the examiner said. He peered around Ran to steal a look at Sakura.

Ran caught the bizarre, fascinated gaze and took a step forward that brought his shoulder into hard contact with the examiner's arm. The physical contact disgusted him on one level and strengthened him on another.

The examiner's attention was ripped from Sakura to Ran. "Walk much, asshole?" he shouted.

"Sorry," Ran answered. He still couldn't clear his voice of its deep tone but that seemed to work well in this situation anyway. Maybe it would help to seem strong, even if it was just false bravado.

/

/

/

"Siberian, you have GOT to be kidding me."

He winced at Omi's tone. Over Ken's cell phone, Omi still sounded as upset as he'd been that one time that Ken had accidentally broken Youji's arm on a mission. It had been dark, that was enough of an excuse, right?

But now, he'd done it. He'd blown his chance to do this mission right—and he'd done it for personal reasons, because of his emotions.

As he paced outside the building, Ken waited for the tirade. Omi wasn't a shouter, but he could add volume to his voice well enough. It was the things he said that were the worst, especially when he brought up Ken's maturity and age compared to his own.

"Have you told the others yet?" Omi asked, exasperated.

Ken jumped on the chance to make Omi forget he was pissed off. He would just talk—a lot. He wouldn't give Omi a chance to get a word—or accusation—in edgewise. "Well, Youji saw me getting thrown out, and he laughed at me, too, because he's an asshole and he'll never make any real friends and that's why Manx doesn't like him, but I couldn't see Fujimiya anywhere, I think he was busy with some girl or something, he's been hanging out with her all night, who knows, maybe they know each other, though that would be pretty bad for Fujimiya, because he shouldn't have long-term contact with people who aren't assassins, and do you think we'll have to kill her? I mean, I don't want to kill her but what if she's a spy from some rival organization who's trying to get information from Fujimiya OH MY GOD I knew that Fujimiya was a spy! That's why he doesn't talk to anybody and he just listens do you want me to kill him when the mission is over? I mean I know I'm just jumping to conclusions but I don't know if Kritiker likes dealing with chances like that...so..."

_Crap. I ran out of things to say. Think, related topics, related topics..._

"...duly noted," Omi replied after a short silence. Ken slapped one hand over his face—Omi hadn't given a good God damn about a single thing he'd said. "By the way, why do you keep calling Abyssinian by his last name?"

The blood drained from Ken's face. He wasn't supposed to know that Aya wasn't 'Aya's' real name. Did—could Omi have figured it out? Did Omi know that Ken knew that Aya was a girl in a hospital bed and that the name of their new teammate wasn't Aya (unless the Fujimiya parents were very unoriginal with baby names)?

"Ga..." Ken stuttered.

"Did you say something?"

_No, not really_, Ken thought. His brain reached for something. Anything.

_Ah ha!_

"...well, it's because 'Aya' is a girl's name," Ken answered in a matter-of-fact way. "And...I don't like calling guys by girls' names." He paused. "Even if that's their—his—actual name."

Ken clenched his fist as he waited for Omi's response. He didn't know why he was afraid, and tense, but he wasn't really a man of logic. Conspiracy theories ran through his mind. Had Omi followed _him_ on the day that he'd been told to follow _Fujimiya_? _How twisted! But that's just like Omi,_ Ken thought.

"I've actually been thinking that myself," Omi replied. Ken's whole body relaxed. The conspiracy theories turned to ashes, and Ken tried to work out some of his tension by kicking out his legs. This mission was proving to be far too long. Ken wasn't the type to sit still in any one place for too long. He was almost glad that he'd been kicked out of the study, and he felt guilty about it.

"Really," Ken said. He laughed a little. "I mean, the girly name goes with the way he looks and dresses, but--"

"It's just as well," Omi cut him off. Ken heard the sound of keys being struck as Omi typed something on his laptop. "We needed one of you to leave the study anyway. I've been looking over the plan of the building, and it seems as thought it would be beneficial to have two men enter from the outside rather than just one, as I'd planned before."

_Just as well? Two men?_ Ken froze in place as he considered this. For the first second, he felt relieved; he hadn't ruined the mission. He wouldn't be held responsible. In the next second, though, he flew into a rage.

"Why didn't you tell me before?" Ken all but shouted at Omi. "Look, you wouldn't know much about it but doing the dirty work isn't much fun, okay? If you didn't need me in there then why did you make all three of us go in there?!"

"Make you?" Omi asked coolly. "This is your job. It's what you get paid to do."

Ken ripped his phone away from his face and glared at it. Hard. He hoped that Omi would burn his stupid mouth with coffee for using that tone with him.

"Like I said, this is something that I just realized. We didn't have a whole lot of time to prepare, but that's what Weiss is like sometimes. Keep your head cool, Siberian...and don't use our real names when you're on a mission."

Ken's fingers clenched the phone tighter before he pulled it back to his face. "_Duly noted, __**Bombay**_," he seethed before ending the call. _Go screw yourself, you little shut-in_, Ken thought. He jammed his phone back into his pocket and began the walk back to his motorcycle. It seemed like he needed to return to home base, and fast.

/

/

/

Ran had found a relatively quiet spot in the waiting room to spend the night in. The examiners handed out sleeping mats and blankets, and Ran took two and set them out for himself and Sakura. She had run off to ask other people if they had water bottles and snacks to spare. Neither of them had brought any food, and considering that he didn't know how long they would ultimately be asked to stay for the study, the possibility of collapsing before the mission was really underway stared to seem quite plausible.

Ran straightened Sakura's mat so that it sat parallel to his, with a short distance between. There was something strange, but gentle and comforting, about the two sleeping mats placed like that. It brought back memories of his sister's sleepovers. She was always a gregarious girl, and bossy, so when she planned sleepovers she meant business. Ran had been chased out of the living room on many occasions so that his sister's friends could have enough room for the activities she had planned.

Of course, there had been that one time that one of Aya's friends had cruelly suggested that they give Ran an unwanted makeover, complete with makeup, hair clips, and the largest girl's spare clothing. Aya had come so close to ripping the girl's head off that Ran had felt a bit of adoration for his younger sister. He preferred to see his sister's power aimed destructively in ways that did not involve him.

Ran found himself wondering absently where his teammates were. He still hadn't seen Ken, and he was beginning to worry. He hoped that he would find him soon, and maybe get a chance to apologize if he'd hurt Ken's feelings. It would make things so easy, at least in that sense, if Ken would just appear behind him, pretending not to see him, and prepare to lay down next to him. He could apologize quietly. Maybe Ken would even seek him out for an apology. A lot of people seemed to do that.

Two fingers tapped his left shoulder and he spun around, exclaiming, "Hidaka?" before he could stop himself.

Instead, he was met with the figure of Kudou Youji. Youji's mouth hung open, undoubtedly ready to deliver some smooth-sounding line about borrowing something or a similar, bland excuse for talking to someone he 'didn't know', but now silent as he tried to digest what Ran had called him, and, more importantly, _why_. Ran's mouth clamped shut and he knocked Youji's hand away, averting his eyes as he sat down on his mat.

"...okay, I'm going to pretend that you didn't just call me that. Whoever-you-are," Youji said. "Not like I know anyone with that name anyway," he added, a small smile tightening his otherwise relaxed face.

"But," he continued, "I was wondering if you'd met anyone named Hidaka since you arrived here tonight," Youji continued, dropping down to Ran's level. "Out of coincidence."

Ran frowned, bringing his gaze to Youji's face. Youji raised an eyebrow expectantly.

"No, I haven't," Ran answered.

"I wonder what the hell he's doing," Youji whispered. "He went in after me, but before you. Were you watching the whole time? You should have seen him."

Ran grimaced. He had been talking to Sakura. She was a very engaging conversationalist. The only way he would have noticed Ken, he realized, would have been if Ken had intentionally made himself noticed.

Considering their apparent falling out, Ran doubted that Ken had done so.

His fears shifted. Sakura had returned from the study, and he doubted that she was in as much danger just walking around the waiting room, but Ken was missing in action. Guilt was compounded by worry. He wondered if Ken had become so upset that he'd left the building to get away from him. That didn't exactly make sense, but Ran had never had much luck understanding other people's emotions.

Ran's eyes flitted around the room for a moment before he answered, "I haven't seen him at all."

Youji sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Man, that guy's such an idiot," he said. "He probably wandered off and got lost. No worries, huh?" he asked, smiling as he clapped Ran on the shoulder. Ran jerked away from the touch and brushed his arm off, trying to get the sensation of Youji's hand on his body out of his memory.

"Aya?"

Youji turned around, moving out of Ran's line of sight as Sakura returned, arms loaded with bottles and wrapped snacks. "Is this man bothering you?" Sakura asked in the most noble tone she could muster.

Youji stole one glance at Ran's stupefied face before laughing loudly. He pulled himself up and walked over to Sakura, who tried to stand up to her full height (and then some) against Youji's tall build.

"Hello, darlin'," he said to her, "who might you be?"

"I'm Aya's friend," she answered.

Youji covered his hand with his mouth and glanced at Ran again, who stared at Sakura's running shoes. He knew that Youji was probably thinking something strange, possibly dirty, and all that he wanted to do was curl up under his blanket and think of ways to apologize to Ken.

_What would Aya do?_

_...kick him in the balls. Hard. I don't feel that's an option for me, somehow._

Youji smiled down at Sakura. "You are too cute. Here, let me give you my number. You can call me on your eighteenth birthday."

Sakura's eyes narrowed in rage. "I don't want it!" she exclaimed, clearly intimidated by Youji but unwilling to show it.

Ran took a breath. This one-second silence was his cue to act. "Sakura, let's go to sleep," he said quietly.

The girl turned away from Youji and brightened instantly. "Okay!" she said cheerfully, dropping the snacks between them and sitting down on the mat Ran had laid out for her. She took off her jacket and put it at the front of the mat to use as a blanket, concentrating on the task at hand the entire time as Youji's body started to shake with laughter.

"Yes, you two have fun going to _sleep with each other,_" Youji said. Ran shot a glare in his direction but turned towards Sakura, lying on his side so that his oldest teammate no longer occupied his vision.

Once he realized that he wasn't about to get a rise out of Ran, Youji walked away, and Ran tore his thoughts away from Youji's lewd insinuation by thinking about Ken.

That didn't feel good, either.

Sakura laid on her side and opened a bottle of juice. "I didn't like him very much," she said sternly, twisting open the bottle with a little to much force. "I'm sorry that I got in his face, I try not to act confrontational, even when I'm upset."

Ran blinked. _She thinks __**that**__ was confrontational?_ "No, I think you did fine," he replied quietly.

"Really?" Sakura asked. She looked away. "I felt mean," she said. "It's just that..."

She drifted off, taking a sip of juice as she thought. Ran waited as she re-capped the bottle and set it on the floor between them. It was apple juice. Neither Ran nor his sister could stand apple juice.

"_That's it, think of anything but Ken_," his mental Aya told him. "_Just turn to me. There's nothing outside the two of us, right? I'm your answer to everything._

"_No! Open your ears and eyes. Don't turn inward, no matter how much you want to. There's so much more! Ken is out there somewhere, maybe in trouble. Who cares about little things? They're all that you ever see! Focus on the big picture."_

He looked back to Sakura.

"...it's just that I'm always watching people bully each other," she said. "Until this year the seniors on the track team always bullied this fat...heavy...girl on the team. I never said anything to them. It made me hate myself so much. I guess I just bottled it up and took it out on that guy."

She blushed. "Oh, I don't even know who he was, I feel so bad now..."

"You shouldn't," Ran answered coldly.

"Well, it wasn't fair," she said. "I just became friends with you, and I've known that girl for a long time, but I never said anything in her defense, and she really needed it."

Ran waited to see if she wanted to share anymore of this story. He wondered if he was doing the wrong thing again—should he have given her words of encouragement? Did he even have any?

Before he could say anything, Sakura sat up. "Oh! I forgot to tell you!" she exclaimed.

Ran raised an eyebrow. She had certainly recovered from her mood quickly. "What is it?"

"The doctor-people said there's something weird about me. I'm super-healthy or something," she said with a smile. "I've always been a good athlete but I had no idea that I was _that_ healthy! They said something like...what was it...physical activity has no effect on me, or something." She smiled wearily. "Is it supposed to? Is that why most people can't run very far? I just thought they got bored."

"...generally, yes," Ran answered. It was one thing to hear about Sakura's physical fitness from the examiners, and another to hear, from her own mouth, that she didn't get tired from running. He figured that she was probably just in good shape from being on her school's track team, though.

"Oh..." she said in fascination. She smiled a little smile before plunking down on her back and beaming at Ran. "Good night!" she said. "I hope they get right to the drugs or whatever tomorrow. I don't like being here very much."

Ran nodded before laying down. "There are a lot of things that make me feel uneasy about this place," he replied.

"Really?" Sakura asked, somewhat amused. "I don't think so. You're too calm."

_Just on the outside._

/

/

/

Ken knocked sharply on the door of the motel room Omi had rented out for surveillance. Their truck, too small for both assassins to stay in, was parked outside. Omi opened the door for him but turned away immediately, offering him no kind greeting (but thankfully, sparing him of the reprimand that he had been certain was coming). Instead of waiting for some sort of acknowledgment, Ken sighed and locked the door behind him, kicking off his shoes and throwing his jacket on the bed. He took a chair across from Omi and pulled one of his legs up to his body, wondering what Omi was working on and what part he would have to play in the mission from then on.

Omi took a sip of coffee and began to work on his computer again. "Abyssinian and Balinese are still inside the building," he said finally. "It seems as though their examinations went smoothly."

_Here it comes_, Ken thought.

Instead of reprimanding Ken directly, Omi just glanced at Ken, turned back to his computer, and did not speak for several minutes. Ken held his breath, and when he felt he'd reached his limit he shouted, "I'm sorry, okay?!"

"Mm," Omi replied. Satisfied, he continued. "Tomorrow morning, I'll need you to enter through the roof—which I doubt you'll have much trouble with, given that there's no surveillance on one side of the building and that the entire roof is pretty much open to whatever bird or beast finds it to be a suitable destination—and give Aya his weapon and gear."

After glaring at Omi for a few seconds (and being ignored) Ken replied, "Alright."

"You should rest up," Omi said. He nodded towards the bed. "Go ahead and sleep. It's going to be a long day tomorrow."

Not ten minutes later, Ken was burrowed under the covers, holding one pillow over his head to block out the light. Omi continued to type and click furiously, and Ken absently wondered if Omi could find a quieter keyboard.

He dreaded the morning. Morning meant Fujimiya, and if he had to give Fuijimiya his sword he knew he'd just feel awkward. He'd been ignored anyway, so no loss...right?

/

/

/

That night, Ken was on a beach. Fujimiya's sister was with him, wearing that same hospital gown, and she kept writing letters in the sand. The tide always came before she was done, and when it erased her work she would glare at the sand furiously before starting over. Ken couldn't read it either way, and he started to back away from her.

He ran.

Tidewater caught his feet and brought him back to where he'd started. He ran harder and harder but never escaped. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that Aya was still writing, gesturing towards him, desperately asking him to read, and when he finally did, a death-eaten hand shot up out of the sand, destroying her message. Aya stared at him in disbelief before grabbing the hand and pushing it back down into the hand, screaming silently all the while, looking back up at Ken's face, waiting for him.

He awoke with a scream. Omi sat sleeping at his computer, slumped over the table with the hood of his jacket pulled over his head. In the glow of early daylight, he looked terrifying, like a dead body that wanted to mimic the actions of the living. His computer screen was still on, and Ken didn't dare look at it.

Ken sat up in bed, wiping sweat from his face. He often had nightmares, though this had felt so different. He shuddered as he remembered the urgency on Aya's face. Why he had dreamed of her, he had no idea, other than the fact that he was worried about Fujimiya.

Fujimiya. It would be time soon.

The clock read 4:23. Ken pulled himself out of bed to take a quick shower before leaving. He clutched Fujimiya's duffel bag tightly as he returned to his bike. If he could do anything right on this mission, he hoped this would be it.

/

/

/

"Wait...why?"

"Miss, please, it's for the study. Please come with us."

"But why me...what about the others...?"

Ran awoke to hushed voices. One of the examiners from yesterday was pulling on Sakura's arm, and she was pulling back, a serious measure of doubt evident on her face.

"What's this?" Ran asked, making less of an effort to hide his voice than the other two.

The examiner glared at him. "This has nothing to do with you," he said. He turned to Sakura. "Come on, you, you're getting a different version of the drug."

Ran realized that Sakura was watching him and when he made eye contact with her, she smiled reassuringly. "Alright," she told the examiner. "I'll come with you, if it'll mean that I can get this over with."

The change in her tone did not pass unnoticed by Ran. He opened his mouth to say something, but Sakura cut him off. "I'll be fine. I don't want to make any trouble," she told him. "Get some more sleep, okay?"

After staring at her in confusion, he closed his mouth and nodded dumbly. Sakura picked up her jacket and followed the examiner, not glancing back a single time.

As she walked away, he remembered that night. Neither of them could move. It had almost killed him inside, when they had turned his face away from his sister. The tranquilizer had pumped through this veins like poison, and his slack muscles hadn't been up to the task of fighting back, of turning his head to see what they were doing to her. They spoke languages he didn't understand. He had wished, so painfully, that he had been better with languages like Aya. Then, he would have understood, he'd thought. Some of it sounded like English. Some of it sounded completely unfamiliar. Then there had been the silent one, the deranged one in the corner, who'd just stared vacantly at his sister the whole time.

This time was different.

He could move.

As soon as Sakura was out of sight, he walked in the direction of the restroom, then bolted past it to the next hallway. Doctors, nurses, and assorted assistants walked the hallway briskly, moving from one room to the next. Ran stopped behind a wall and listened.

"Oh, they're working on 'Workhorse Girl', huh?" one of them asked.

Ran clenched his hand into a fist. He wished he had his sword, or that he had been more skilled in hand-to-hand combat. Now, all he could do was wait and listen...

"Yeah," another replied. "That heart of hers is going to sell so well."

He left the wall before he had even realized it. They shouted at him but he could barely hear. As he drew nearer, he could hear a girl's muffled cries coming from one of the rooms. He grabbed the nearest examiner by the collar and threw him against the wall, hurting him but not knocking him unconscious. One of them grabbed him from behind and shouted, "Guards! We need a guard--"

And just like that, the examiner turned to dead weight and fell off Ran's body as though his legs could not hold him.

Alarmed, Ran spun around in time to face Ken, who took an offensive step towards him before jumping back and whirling his hands around in front of his face.

"Fujimiya?!" he shouted.

Ran covered Ken's mouth with his hand and hissed, "Shut up!"

In that second, the mission, the study, and Sakura all seemed to disappear. He was touching another human being, and he didn't feel dirty or ashamed. Unaware of himself, he continued to glare at Ken as he held his hand over his mouth, and Ken glared back over his hand.

_Why..._

Ken swung the black duffel bag into Ran's body. It hit Ran in the stomach, and he pulled his hand away from Ken's face not only to take the duffel bag, but also to recover from the blow as he bent over from pain. Ken stood over him and asked, "Fujimiya, what the _hell_ are you doing here?!"

Ran stood up. He could still hear Sakura in the room, and without answering Ken's question (or his attack) he opened the door to find Sakura halfway strapped down to an operation table, her clothes lying on the floor. She cried out when Ran entered the room but he averted his eyes, pulling a spare lab coat from the wall and throwing it over her. Ken began to sputter and ask him again just what the _hell_ was going on but Ran ignored him, unbuckling Sakura's arms and legs. The little touches he accidentally placed on her limbs still brought him disgust. His hands shook from discomfort from the physical contact.

It had been different with Ken.

"Fujimiya!" Ken repeated. Sakura turned away from them and put on the lab coat, pulling on her panties and pants afterward. Ken stared in confusion between her and Ran, holding his hands up as if to reinforce his earlier question.

"She was about to be killed," Ran answered coldly. He took care to avoid eye contact with Ken.

Ken rounded the table, side-stepping Sakura as he did so. "You were _not_ supposed to be here. What if I hadn't come in, at just the right time and the right place?"

Sakura turned toward Ken, her face a little red, though it was clear that she was able to think clearly enough to rank her life above her privacy on this one occasion. Bowing slightly, she began, "Um, thank you--"

"You!" Ken shouted, holding a hand up to Sakura. She made a small frightened sound but said nothing else. "No more talking. You're like a fucking mouse now, got it?"

She nodded.

Ken turned back to Fujimiya. "What the fuck were you thinking?! Rescue isn't our thing! You can't go on personal business while you're on a mission!"

Momentarily forgetting his decision to not intimidate Ken, Ran turned towards him, shocked. "Are you saying that I shouldn't have saved her? They were about to cut her body open! They were talking about selling her body parts!"

Ken blinked at Ran's outburst, but he was too angry to back down. "Weiss isn't responsible for that! We have these rules for a reason—and we follow them for a reason! You were about to get your ass handed to you because you didn't have your sword yet! And whose fault would that have been? Yours!"

Unable to come up with anything else to say, and by this point unsettled by his own rage, Ken took a breath before grabbing Sakura's arm and jerking her forward. She pulled back but Ken seemed to not care particularly about her desire to stay away from him. "He just saved your life," Ken growled. "Are you going to tell anybody about him?"

Sakura stared at him in fear for a moment before grasping what he meant. "No!" she cried, trying to get free of Ken's grip.

"Hidaka, let her go," Ran barked at him.

Ken ignored Ran, and pulled Sakura closer. "If you ever tell anyone about him, then I'll know who it was who talked, got it? And I'll find you and kill you."

"I won't! I won't!" she cried, genuinely afraid.

Ken nodded and pushed her away. He turned to see Ran regarding him with disgust, and he averted his gaze from his older teammate. "Now go back to the others," he commanded her.

Sakura nodded and tried to leave the room, but Ran held a hand out for her. She stopped and watched his hand in the air, holding back tears.

Ran felt disappointed somehow. Ken had seemed a little careless, and insensitive, but not cruel. He stared Ken down, wondering why he'd ever felt he needed to apologize to him. Ken's gaze shifted from the floor to Ran's face and Ran thought, for a moment, that he'd seen something different there. Sadness, or fear maybe. He glared back at Ken, too angry from Ken's sudden behavior change to care about his anxieties.

"I'll take her back," Ran said, picking up his duffel bag, "and then I'll meet you in a few minutes."

He was instantly met with opposition; Sakura, though clearly shaken, began to stammer out reassurances that she could make it back on her own, and Ken, still angry, just stared at him. Ran shook his head and said, "It will only be a minute or two. Just don't go too far and I'll meet up with you."

Ken opened his mouth to say something, but just folded his arms, resigned, and Ran took his chance to leave the room with Sakura. On his way out, though, he felt Ken's hand on his arm.

Still, nothing. No fear. No disgust. He was angry with Ken, but he didn't seem him as a walking sickness, a contaminant. Ken was warm—enraged and warm.

Sakura turned to wait for him, and when Ran was sure she wasn't going farther he met Ken's eyes. Ken glanced away before glaring back.

"You're going to get yourself killed, or someone's going to turn you in," he said. "I know you think you're a white fucking knight or something right now, but there are too many people here for us to worry about them all. And there's nothing right about picking and choosing which ones to protect."

Ran watched his face silently and Ken's hand dropped from his arm, and his gaze fell from Ran's face. Ken looked tired. He hadn't noticed it before, but Ken looked exhausted. "I could have you taken off the team for doing shit like that," Ken said, and Ran knew what being 'taken off the team' really meant. "Just remember that," Ken added, turning away from Ran.

Ran gave him a quick nod before running down the hall after Sakura. Ken watched them go, and when they were out of sight he turned the other way.

He regretted some of the ugly things he'd said to Fujimiya, but it had hurt to be treated so coldly by his teammate—as if Fujimiya had tried to prove to him that he wasn't human—and then to see him turn around and act like he knew what it meant to care about another person's well-being. Ken supposed that maybe he hadn't hit it off with Fujimiya because he wasn't a pleasant person to be around.

What alarmed Ken more, was Fujimiya's apparent ignorance of mission priorities and protocol. Ken had seen innocent people killed on Weiss missions many times in the past. Sometimes they were too late, and they couldn't save anyone by eliminating their target. Sometimes, taking out the target didn't help anyone at all. Maybe this was all just what Persia wanted—maybe their targets were Persia's personal enemies and trespassers, and Weiss was merely a team of petty assassins, unconcerned with the state of their country, indifferent to human life. Ken couldn't argue that human life was too precious to waste, not after what he'd lost. The fact that he could live after what he'd been through...after what had happened to Kase...if he could continue life after losing the person who was most important to him, then the lives of others were completely meaningless. He had felt a cold distance grow between himself and everyone else around him. There was nothing that he couldn't afford to lose, and he knew that he was a terrible human being because of it.

But, it was that distance that allowed Weiss to do its job. Ken knew that Weiss needed to be strong, and to be able to see past the occasional wrongdoing or lost moment, to make any sort of difference in the lives of ordinary civilians.

Most importantly, if he could live through Weiss long enough to hunt down Takatori, then all of this—his discomfort around Fujimiya, his confusion between what was right and wrong, the sickness he felt for his own body—would fade away. He would be able to die, to stop running and killing and throwing other people's lives away.

_Where would Kase be right now?_ Ken wondered. He could imagine Kase laughing again. They would go to dinner and talk about soccer. They would talk about their coach. They would talk about whether the cute girl sitting a few tables down was looking at Kase or Ken. And Ken would tell Kase to go and talk to her, and he would...

The rage that had consumed his body dissipated as Ken smiled. He shook himself, returning all to quickly to his surroundings and the mission. Walking quietly down the hallway, he tried to keep Omi's advice in mind as he approached the next room. He could see the form of a man waiting inside, and he threw the door open only to be arrested by the sight that awaited him.

There were no doctors, no nurses, no examiners or administrators of any kind. Instead, one man sat, his back turned to Ken, but the outline of the head, neck, and shoulders, was something Ken could never have forgotten.

He fell to his knees, and the door clicked shut behind him as the man slowly turned around in the chair.


End file.
